Wasatch Front Waste & Recycling district outlines service mix, proposes targeted fees

Wasatch Front Waste & Recycling District General Manager Evan Tyrell told the Cottonwood Heights City Council on Feb. 17 that the district operates as an enterprise fund and relies on fees rather than property or sales taxes to cover operations. He said the base residential service is $26 a month and includes weekly trash and recycling collection, with optional curbside green-waste and glass services available.

Tyrell described recent operational metrics: the district handled more than 109,000 tons of curbside trash and roughly 18,000 tons of recycling last year; Cottonwood Heights contributed about 15,000 curbside tons in 2025. He said the green-waste curbside subscription is billed at $12 per month; the seasonal service currently runs roughly March through mid-December, and staff are considering extending that window.

The presentation flagged several policy and fee proposals the board has tentatively adopted to help offset rising processing and payment costs. Tyrell said the district is considering a card-payment transaction fee to encourage lower-cost payment methods such as ACH; an ACH option would remain fee-free. He also described a nominal $25 return-pickup fee for verified missed collections and a recycling-contamination fee that would be applied only in rare circumstances after repeated, documented contamination issues and education efforts.

Council members pressed staff on enforcement and detection: Tyrell said drivers’ cameras, a quality-assurance tagging program and targeted outreach are used to identify repeat contamination and that education remains the first step. He reported a decrease in Cottonwood Heights’ contamination rate from about 8.07% in 2022 to roughly 2.69% in 2025.

Tyrell also reviewed fleet and equipment choices that are driving long-term budgets. He said the district operates about 56 collection trucks and normally replaces roughly eight trucks per year. Citing current market prices, he said diesel replacement trucks are approximately $60,000 less expensive per unit than compressed natural gas models; at eight trucks per year this translates to potential savings of about $400,000 annually on vehicle replacement costs. He noted emissions-control advances for modern diesel trucks but acknowledged tradeoffs that the council raised about air quality.

Tyrell said the board is preparing comparative cost information for the district’s March 2 trustees meeting, and that staff will publish board packets and the data visualizations publicly. He offered to follow up with more granular, per-capita and per-household diversion metrics on request.

What’s next: the Wasatch Front Waste & Recycling District will include these topics in its March board packet and pursue additional outreach; Cottonwood Heights councilors asked for follow-up data on per-household diversion and the operational effects of any new fees.