911±¬ÁϳԹÏ

Parkersburg resident Ray Vannoy, left, holds signs calling for the city to keep providing in-house sanitation service prior to a community meeting organized to discuss the service Thursday at St. Joseph Landing. At right is Parkersburg resident Greg Sanders. (Photo by Evan Bevins)

PARKERSBURG — About 30 people attended a community meeting Thursday to discuss the City of Parkersburg’s sanitation service and proposals to privatize it.

Parkersburg City Councilwoman Wendy Tuck, former Councilman Jeff Fox and other citizens organized the meeting at St. Joseph Landing as the city administration is negotiating a potential contract for a private company to take over a service Parkersburg has provided for decades.

“We’re meeting here to talk about what nobody on City Council is talking about,” Tuck said.

No public meeting has yet been scheduled on the proposed contract. Tuck and some residents have called for public input on the potential contract, and some other council members have said they want people to have that opportunity.

A joint council committee voted in June to seek requests for proposals from private haulers to take over sanitation service.

Parkersburg City Councilwoman Wendy Tuck, left, welcomes people to a community meeting about the city’s sanitation service Thursday evening at St. Joseph Landing as Jeff Fox, a former council member who helped organize the meeting, listens. (Photo by Evan Bevins)

The city received bids from Rumpke and Waste Management to provide sanitation service. The administration is in the process of negotiating a contract with one of the providers, which would then be presented to council for consideration.

“At the same time council will or can review all the associated proposals, deliberative documents and scoring materials as well as any alternative solutions or processes to return the solid waste collection to (a) level of service commensurate to past levels,” Mayor Tom Joyce said earlier Thursday.

According to bid documents submitted to the city, Rumpke would initially charge the city $19.76 per residence for the first two years, increasing to $24.52 by the fifth year. If recycling were collected on a weekly basis instead of bi-weekly, those amounts would increase to $22.50 to start and $27.92 by the fifth year.

Waste Management’s bid, which includes bi-weekly recycling, would start at $22 per unit and increase to $26.95 in the fifth year.

City Finance Director Eric Jiles previously said the per-unit charge does not equate to the amount residents would be billed. The city will bill residents and pay the selected vendor, so it will have overhead costs like statements, postage and personnel.

Former Parkersburg City Councilman Jeff Fox outlines hypothetical funding for the city’s Sanitation Department during a community meeting Thursday at St. Joseph Landing. (Photo by Evan Bevins)

The monthly sanitation fee is $22, after council voted to increase it by $4 a month to cover shortfalls in the sanitation fund and salary increases.

The city suspended its curbside recycling service in May citing staffing issues caused by vacancies and increased call-offs.

Despite $2-an-hour raises for medium equipment operators in Sanitation and other city departments approved in the spring that went into effect July 1, those issues have continued.

“Currently the Sanitation (Department) is being backfilled daily with personnel from other public works divisions (commercial driver’s license holders) including parks/floodwall, streets and street cleaning,” Joyce said. “This began a few weeks ago as we continue to have multiple openings in sanitation resulting from lack of qualified applicants and several longer term personnel have transferred to other departments as openings have been posted.”

Evan Bevins can be reached at ebevins@newsandsentinel.com