Council talks trash

Until a few weeks ago, local trash haulers such as River Valley, Johnson and Gamby’s helped Columbia by emptying trash receptacles in the downtown area and the borough parks.
No more. That job belongs to Waste Management of York. The move to take the trash business out of town has angered not only haulers, but members of borough council as well.
The trash collection was a topic of discussion at Monday’s borough council meeting, with council admitting it knew nothing about the change.
“We were doing trash cans and we gave the borough a reduced rate,” said Ted Johnson of Johnson’s Disposal.
Johnson said only one of the local haulers, River Valley Disposal, was notified of having to bid for the services.
Borough Manager Norm Meiskey explained that information to trash haulers was sent out by using the yellow pages of the telephone book and if the local haulers weren’t listed, they didn’t get the information. The borough manager acknowledged that Johnson wasn’t on the list, but wouldn’t have been chosen because of problems with his trash collection.
Bob Kline of River Valley, also objected to the borough’s method.
“Why go to the phone book, when there’s a list of licensed haulers?” Kline asked the council.
Meiskey said that no such list existed. He also said that letters were sent out and those who didn’t want to bid on the services, just didn’t. The borough manager also said that Gamby’s Disposal didn’t want to bid on the trash collection.
So after going through the process, because the cost was under $10,000, which would have forced the borough to seek bids, not quotes for the trash service, Waste Management was awarded the service.
Kline provided some details on Waste Management’s plan, saying that the York company’s bid was for 12 cans and after going around and counting the cans, his was for 24, plus six in parks.
“Had I bid the same package as Waste Management, I would have saved the borough $762,” Kline said.
Before council had a chance to address the issue, a few citizens spoke.
Those who spoke didn’t like the fact the service was taken out of the hands of the local haulers, considering they volunteered their time for events such as the Spring Clean-Up in April.
“Waste Management won’t volunteer in April because they don’t care about this town,” said Shirley McBride.
John Neidig wanted to know if council voted on the change.
“Was this voted on and passed by the council in an open forum?: Neidig asked.
“It was handled by the borough manager,” said Council President Sandy Duncan. “We are reviewing it.”
“This is cowboy stuff,” Neidig said.
Meiskey said that if there is an error, the borough will investigate it and correct the error.
“Waste Management had the lowest quote and we must go with whoever quotes the lowest,” Meiskey said.
Said Councilman Vern Detz, “this is on the top of my list to find out what happened.”
“I was taken back by this decision, because we just found out when it became public knowledge,” Detz said.
“This will not be a dead issue with this borough council and will be acted upon. There will be a resolution to this,” Detz said.
“Council was not aware of this decision, relieving local haulers,” said Councilwoman Mary Barninger.
“I am troubled by this determination,” she said.
“We must do what we can to promote local businesses and we have to support

No to trucks

At it’s meeting Monday, Columbia Borough Council passed a resolution not to allow trucks on any streets in town, except Route 462 and 441.
While it won’t take care of the major problem of eliminating major truck traffic, the move will curtail what streets those big trucks can travel on.

Monday’s move limits truck traffic on the remainder of the borough’s streets, except if they are making local deliveries. The reason for the move, council said was simple. Because of congestion caused by the big rigs, the trucks were looking for shorter routes around Columbia, often times using other streets not designed for trucks, to avoid congestion in the center of town.

While that move might seem like a minor one, council continues to dig in for a major fight as it attempts to secure funding for the relocation of Route 441 around Columbia.

Currently, the $12 million project is on life support.

The borough and Mayor Leo Lutz have spent much of the last three weeks, since it was announced the project might be in trouble, contacting county, state and federal government officials and legislators.
The borough is again circulating petitions throughout the community, asking residents to sign to showing support for the alternate truck route.

“We need to show county, state and federal government officials that this is essential,” Lutz said.

“We want to leave no stone unturned. We’ve been contacting everybody to plead our case,” Lutz said.

This week, Lutz said he plans to speak to a representative from Sen. Arlen Specter’s office and attend a meeting of the Lancaster County Transportation Advisory Committee. He also said there is the possibility of yard sign being purchased and placed throughout the borough.

The mayor said he had to talk residents out of protesting plans to pull the finances for the project by laying in streets in an attempt to block trucks.

For more, read this week's Columbia Ledger.