19 - Renewing the Landfill Services Agreement with Waste Connections, Inc.

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Item No. 19 Memorandum TO: Mayor, Mayor Pro Tem & City Council FROM: Grayson Path, City Manager Stephanie Harris, City Attorney Michael Smith, Public Works Director SUBJECT: Landfill Services Agreement Renewal DATE: September 13, 2021 Background As you know, the City of Paris provides residential trash collection for its residents. All residents are charged a flat amount on their utility bill for trash collection each month. The City picks this trash up twice a week with a Monday / Thursday route and a Tuesday / Friday route. On February 14, 2011, the City of Paris entered into a ten (10) year agreement with Sanitation Solutions, Inc. (now dba Waste Connection, Inc.) for landfill services connected to the city's residential trash collection services. The ten (10) year landfill services agreement expired unexpectedly in March 2021. Neither City Staff nor Waste Connection, Inc. had this on their radar to prepare for. The City Manager was informed after the fact, but due to a significant amount of other tasks on his plate, he was forced to ask Waste Connection for a month-to-month extension. They granted this request, but they have asked that we make a decision regarding renewal by October lst, which is understandable. As to why this was missed, the best guess that we can provide is the amount of time attached to this agreement and the amount of turnover since it was approved. While the City should be monitoring all of its contracts, this does not always happen as efficiently as it should and sometimes things get missed, especially on contracts that have terms in excess of five years. Nevertheless, the City Manager is disappointed that we did not catch this sooner. In any event, as will be discussed below, the City may still enter into a renewal contract with Waste Connections because solid waste disposal services are an exception to Texas competitive bidding laws. This is an attractive option for many reasons. Not the least of these is the operational expense associated with transporting solid waste from the city to the landfill. Given the City does not have