Augusta officials briefed on Coastal takeover of trash service, recycling rollout and vote to pursue sale of CNG fueling assets

Coastal Waste & Recycling representatives told Augusta–Richmond County commissioners that they have trucks and drivers in place to start the city’s new solid-waste contract and outlined a timetable to relaunch subscription recycling while the commission debated how to pay for ancillary services. The contractor’s senior vice president, John Casagrande, said the company has trucks in Augusta and “we were able to hire 10 of the 12 incumbent drivers from Zone 1,” and that subcontractors will continue to handle some bulk collection. Casagrande said Coastal will remove roughly 68,000 city recycling carts beginning Aug. 1, accept signups for subscription recycling through a public web portal and deliver new branded carts “sometime in November.” He said citywide curbside recycling collection is expected to begin “January 1,” without specifying a year. Why it matters: The county’s new contract replaces prior arrangements and changes recycling from a universal curbside service to a subscription model. Commissioners said…