Exclusive 5-Year Trash Collection Contract Angers Competing Firms : City services: The chosen company will supply new 100-gallon bins and start a recycling program.

SOUTH GATE —  Trash haulers, some of whom have done business in South Gate for decades, are up in arms over City Council approval of a five-year agreement giving Western Waste Industries the exclusive right to collect commercial and industrial rubbish in the city after July 1.

“No one was notified and no bidding was done,” said Robert Sarkesian, general manager of All Service Disposal, which has been a South Gate hauler for 15 years. Others argue that the Western Waste monopoly will deprive business customers of the right to choose among the 14 trash companies the city now franchises, including Western Waste.

“We’re supposed to have free enterprise,” said John Belikoff, whose family-run Haul-A-Way company has operated in South Gate for 18 years.

City Manager Todd Argow said he considered putting the contract up for bid but decided to negotiate a commercial franchise with Western Waste--which has had exclusive right to collect South Gate residential rubbish for 23 years--because the company was willing to give the city the terms it wanted. In addition, he said, Western Waste already has about 80% of the commercial trash business in South Gate, a contention that some trash haulers dispute.

According to Argow, key gains for the city in the agreement are higher franchise fees than licensed commercial haulers currently pay the city, along with Western Waste’s willingness to assume full responsibility for South Gate’s compliance with state-mandated reduction of the amount of waste trucked to local landfills.

Gardena-based Western Waste will pay the city 15% of its gross receipts, which Argow estimates at $300,000 during the first year. Haulers currently pay 10% of their gross and Argo said fees totaled $149,638 last year. Western Waste alone accounted for $90,695, he said.

Under terms of its agreement, Western Waste will pay fees on some trash collection, such as large roll-off bins, that is not included in present franchises. Distinctive Western Waste trucks and bins also will permit the city to spot illegal haulers who pay nothing to the city.

Concern that landfills are rapidly reaching capacity prompted the Legislature to require cities to reduce their trash hauling by 25% by 1995 and 50% by 2000.

“Western Waste is in charge of all the hauling and it can take responsibility for reporting the waste stream reduction,” Argow said, adding that the company also will be liable for any penalties levied for noncompliance.

He said that with a number of haulers, the city would have to compile the information from different record systems and, in some cases, “look over their shoulders” to be sure they were reporting correctly. “Most cities are consolidating trash pickup to comply,” he said.

The company will supply residents with free 100-gallon trash cans and 18-gallon recycling containers for a curbside recycling program that Western will begin in March. Western Waste will also conduct an intensive public information campaign to encourage recycling to divert material from the refuse system, and to encourage commercial enterprises to avoid creating waste by such things as not buying overpackaged goods.

For their part, other South Gate haulers said their major criticism is that the city acted unfairly in not giving them notice that it was in the process of choosing an exclusive carrier.

“Maybe we could give a better price than Western Waste. They didn’t give us a chance,” said Mary Arsenian, owner of Sav-Way Disposal, a small company that she said has hauled on and off in South Gate for 50 years. “If these big companies bulldoze their way in, they will put the little rubbish man out of business.”

Argow said South Gate sent notices to all haulers in 1985, informing them that the city would switch to an exclusive franchise for commercial waste collection no sooner than 1990. “Our thinking was that we gave them five year’s notice,” Argow said, adding that he doesn’t think the city has been unfair.

“If I were a waste hauler, I would be keeping in closer contact with the city and taking the initiative to find out what’s going on,” he said.

As a result of the trash controversy, city officials will meet with the haulers Feb. 6 at City Hall to answer questions and explain how the Western Waste agreement will be implemented. Argow said he has heard nothing so far to justifying backpedaling on the deal, which he called “a huge benefit for the city.”