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Background:
<br />The City of Paris has provided sanitation services for many years. In addition to residential pick up, city
<br />sanitation services include street sweeping, brush pickup, a compost site, and post closure maintenance of
<br />the City's old landfill.
<br />An initiative petition was filed on June 10, 2005 with the City Clerk with the goal of preventing
<br />privatization of residential trash pickup either by having the Council vote for an ordinance creating such a
<br />restriction or calling for an election to decide the issue. An election was held September 10, 2005 with
<br />citizens voting 1,072 to 737 not to privatize residential trash pickup. An ordinance to that affect was
<br />passed on September 19, 2005 and the City was prevented from revisiting the issue for two years. The
<br />ordinance states that the Public Works Department using City equipment and employees shall provide the
<br />collection, handling, and disposition of all residential garbage, trash, and rubbish. The ordinance further
<br />states that the Council shall set a monthly rate for residential garbage handling and disposition which rate
<br />shall reflect the cost of such service which will include the component parts of employee cost, equipment
<br />cost, landfill cost, and billing cost. The sanitation fee in 2005 was $14 per month and has not changed.
<br />Should the City now vote to privatize residential pickup, it should be understood that some sanitation
<br />expenses would continue, i.e. those related to street sweeping, landfill maintenance, compost site
<br />operation, and brush pickup. Following the City Council's request, the City Manager directed that I
<br />calculate the full cost of operating the City's sanitation deparhnent. With that goal in mind, I chose to use
<br />the Municipal Solid Waste Services Full Cost Accounting Workbook for Texas Local Governments as the
<br />methodology for making the calculation because it would be a generally accepted method for such
<br />calculations. I have attached a copy of the workbook in its entirety. The workbook is designed to cover all
<br />cost allocation possibilities i.e. residential pickup, commercial pickup, recycling, and other appropriate
<br />programs. Since the city primarily does only residential pickup, I have made no attempt to allocate costs
<br />to street sweeping or other minor cost areas. Likewise, I have not shown needless detail. For example,
<br />salaries are shown lump sum as are related benefits. Therefore pages 18, 23, 26, 27, 31, 33, 39, 42, and 48
<br />contain all of the necessary information.
<br />For purposes of this calculation, I have used numbers from the current 2007-08 budget. There are 12 full
<br />time positions and 50% of another position allocated to the Sanitation Department. Those positions are 10
<br />solid waste collectors, 1 street sweeper, 1 supervisor, and %z of the Asst. Public Works Director. $23,000
<br />is also budgeted for temporary help if needed. Three of the 10 collectors also spend part of their time
<br />working at the compost site, running a second sweeper when needed, and doing brush pickup.
<br />Below is additional information showing the full cost accounting sanitation rate, the resulting shortfall
<br />because the rate remained at $14 per month, and the equivalent tax rate to cover the shortfall amount.
<br />YEAR RATE SHORTFALL TAX RATE
<br />05-06 $20.24 $603,083 3.15 cents
<br />06-07 $18.43 $428,150 3.25 cents
<br />07-08 $19.35 $517,067 3.71 cents
<br />The primary reason for the drop after the 05-06 year was the reduction of the number of collectors. The
<br />primary reasons for the increase in 07-08 were landfill costs, a cash payment on a lease agreement, and
<br />indirect costs.
<br />Also included in the attachment is a spreadsheet that gives an estimated breakdown of total sanitation
<br />costs between collection costs, non-collection costs, and indirect costs. The allocation should be adequate
<br />to allow Council to understand the overall picture of sanitation expenses.
<br />r U0U1O I
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