The Finance Committee focused on solid waste after packet numbers showed nearly 90% collection for municipal solid waste but only about 14% for waste disposal invoicing, prompting questions about coding and uncollected invoices.

Staff said the city is carrying a negative balance in the solid waste account and that Cassell‑related invoicing and coding changes contributed to the appearance of revenue shortfalls. Committee members and staff debated several options to address the shortfall: raising resident sticker fees, eliminating “small‑scale” scaling accounts where residents pay pennies for truckloads, increasing a minimum charge for scale users (one suggestion was a $40 minimum), or moving curbside collection in‑house by buying a truck and using Public Works staff.

“There’s a few changes that I wanna make there. I wanna increase the trash resident stickers, to kind of more truly match costs. I kind of consider it more of an enterprise account,” a staff member told the committee. Staff also said the city has only a few bidders for disposal services; if Cassell remains the sole viable bidder when the contract expires, the city needs an alternative plan to avoid being forced to accept large fee increases.

Why it matters: the committee was told sticker and scale revenue leakage could amount to “multiple hundreds of thousands of dollars,” which shifts costs to taxpayers who do not use the transfer station. Committee members pressed for a better process to collect small payments and suggested process improvements, an online payments or credit card system, and clearer thresholds when an account should be classified as commercial versus residential.

Ending: staff asked for more time to present options; they said they will return to the committee with cost comparisons for in‑house curbside collection, suggested sticker/scale fee schedules, and scenarios showing revenue gains from proposed changes.