East Bethel council hears pros and cons of organized garbage collection from ACE and local haulers
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Summary
ACE Solid Waste representatives told the East Bethel council that changing to an organized or limited-hauler system is legally and administratively complex, can require additional city staff and may not reduce road or overall costs for residents; they recommended incremental changes and further study.
Representatives of ACE Solid Waste and local haulers briefed the East Bethel City Council on Jan. 12 about the trade-offs of shifting from a multi-hauler model to an organized collection or limited-hauler system.
Chris Guilaforest of ACE summarized the legal landscape, saying “there is a a statute, a law that governs all of this. It's very complex,” and advised that the city involve legal counsel and staff early because converting thousands of individual household arrangements into a single municipal contract requires detailed negotiation. He said such contracts are typically long and dense — “about 25 to 35, maybe even 40 pages of dense legal contract.”
Why it matters: proponents of organized collection often point to headline price reductions, but ACE cautioned that those figures can mask subsidies and general-fund costs. An unidentified council member noted Ham Lake’s headline rate is lower; a presenter explained that Ham Lake uses county "SCORE" funds to subsidize recycling pickup, which reduces resident fees while shifting costs elsewhere.
Cost and staffing risks featured in the exchange. Guilaforest told the council he had “never seen a city that has moved to this type of system not have to hire additional FTE to deal with it,” citing added customer-service and contract-management workload. He also cited Anoka’s recent experience, saying legal fees alone ran “about $40,000” and that a city council member put total implementation costs at over $100,000 in that case.
Road damage and vehicle impacts came up repeatedly. Dave Wiggins of ACE described Ham Lake’s historical move to a consortium model that divided the city into pickup zones, and the panel explained that organized systems can reduce truck frequency but increase per-truck weight. Guilaforest quoted engineers’ conclusions that the “culprit in beating up our roads is the thing we can't control... the freeze thaw cycle,” cautioning that transitions have not reliably produced road-budget savings in other cities.
Alternatives and next steps: presenters urged East Bethel to consider intermediate steps before a full municipal takeover. Recommendations included updating licensing and insurance requirements, limiting the number of licenses, coordinating collection days (day-zone collection) and meeting directly with haulers to address specific roads and routing. Guilaforest said the "lightest touch" often works best and offered ACE’s help in meeting with staff.
Council direction: members requested more information and agreed to schedule a follow-up work session to examine options and data, including narrower proposals such as license changes, route adjustments and targeted protections for vulnerable roads. No formal motion or vote occurred.
Sources: Presentation and Q&A with Chris Guilaforest (ACE Solid Waste) and Dave Wiggins (ACE) at the East Bethel city council work session on Jan. 12, 2026.
