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Service director recommends keeping city-run green-waste program, buying smaller rear-loader truck
Summary
Service Director Joe Shaw told the Parks & Forestry Committee that data collected on route stops, hours, and costs favors continuing the city-operated green-yard-waste program with a smaller rear-load truck (option 3), citing equipment-reliability and equity concerns about vendor proposals.
Service Director Joe Shaw recommended that Sylvania continue a city-operated green-yard-waste program and purchase a smaller rear-load truck rather than privatize service or adopt a single-operator front-loader/toter model.
Shaw presented six weeks of route-level data and a 15-year cost model. He said the city logged a little more than 1,800 crew hours collecting green waste in 2024 and sampled service stops from June 8 through July 19, finding roughly 1,050–1,100 stops every two weeks during peak periods. "We make anywhere between 1050 and 1100 stops every 2 weeks," Shaw said. He also said fewer than 20% of the city's refuse/recycling customers used the green-waste service during the sampled period, which factored into vendor proposals that would charge all households rather than only users.
Shaw reviewed three options: (1) privatization (vendors proposed April–October service and would bill the full 6,028-unit base), (2) a single-operator front-loader with purchased toters (vehicle quotes near $515,000 and no reliable local rental replacement if the truck failed), and (3) a two-person rear-loader similar to the current operation but with a smaller 11-yard truck price under $200,000. He cautioned about redundancy for the toter/front-loader model, saying vendors "didn't want anything to do other than those months" and that renting replacement vehicles was not available to the city.
On revenue and operating expenses, Shaw said sticker-and-bag revenue for the program runs about $70,000 a year while bags/stickers cost the city about $22,000 annually. He noted labor is paid under the AFSCME rate used in modeling ($53.49/hour) and that the city has spent about $62,500 in maintenance on the existing truck over 15 years. Based on his modeling, Shaw recommended option 3, observing a small long-term cost advantage and fewer operational risks: "Privatization is hard for me when you're asking, you know, 80% of your community to subsidize the program..."
The Parks & Forestry Committee accepted the presentation and Chair Sean Murphy noted the meeting would end without formal action; Shaw said he will return with contract modifications and truck-purchase authorization if council directs moving forward.
