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City officials are seeking new bids from garbage haulers in an effort to cut costs and save money.
A legal advertisement was placed in the Daily News this week seeking proposals, which could be voted on at the Sept. 3 city council meeting.
It's not a sign that the city is dissatisfied with Scottdale-based Greenridge Waste Services, its current collector, but it is a sign that an economy move is in full swing.
The Greenridge contract will automatically renew on Sept. 30 unless the city chooses to opt out.
McKeesport is staring at a half-million budget shortfall caused by several unexpected problems, including rapidly rising expenses for health care and fuel, and lost revenue from a proposed cell phone tower in the Seventh Ward that's yet to be built because of objections from nearby residents.
Mayor Jim Brewster says the city currently pays Greenridge about $1.2 million per year for trash collection. The price is guaranteed through 2009.
Last month, Pittsburgh Mayor Luke Ravenstahl pitched his city's services --- including fire protection and trash collection --- to other municipalities in Allegheny County.
McKeesport City Administrator Dennis Pittman said the city would be interested in receiving a proposal for trash pickup from Pittsburgh, which already collects residential garbage in Wilkinsburg Borough.
The three-year agreement between Wilkinsburg and Pittsburgh is saving the smaller community an estimated $1 million annually.
But Pittman says the city also expects to receive bids from more conventional, private-sector haulers, such as Waste Management.
And he and other city officials cautioned residents against assuming that a new hauler will be selected.
Small trash collection companies might not have the capability to collect from all of the city's nearly 10,000 households without adding equipment and personnel, they said, and there's some doubt that they could ramp up their capacity between September --- when a potential new contract would be awarded --- and Jan. 1 of next year.
On a related note, a study published Sunday in the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review questions whether the deal between Pittsburgh and Wilkinsburg is really providing any benefit.
Authored by Jake Haulk and Eric Montarti of the Allegheny Institute for Public Policy, the study suggests that city of Pittsburgh taxpayers are subsidizing the cost of trash collection in the neighboring borough.
While that city is charging Wilkinsburg $120 per household for residential waste pickup, Haulk and Montarti estimate the real cost to Pittsburgh is about $202 per household.
They argue that because of inefficiency and pension obligations, Pittsburgh's municipal trash collection services are more expensive than those a private hauler would provide.
Headquartered in Mt. Lebanon, the Allegheny Institute is a conservative/libertarian think tank funded in large part by grants from charities controlled by publisher and philanthropist Richard Mellon Scaife, owner of the Tribune-Review, Daily News, and scores of other weekly and daily newspapers around the Pittsburgh area.
Aw Jeeez here we go again!
Just when one thinks that it cannot possibly get any worse living in McKeesport it does.
Now besides facing budget crises that the city elders are suggesting the insane idea of shutting off the street lights to save $500,000 a year, we are now facing a garbage collection fiasco.
What ever happened with the idea of a company coming into town and building that great garbage incinerator at the old Firth Sterling Site in Demmler?
As I recall this garbage incinerator was the best thing since sliced bread. It basically worked almost using the theory of perpetual motion once up and running. Once the first load of garbage was lit this plant would then heat the garbage and then once the garbage was dried of all the wonderful juices that trash produces, the dried garbage would then be cleanly and efficiently incinerated and the heat generated from the incineration process would then heat the incoming refuse to be burned and also produce vast amounts of cheap electrical power that would Light up most of the Eastern seaboard including parts of the Midwest.
Recently I read in the paper that the Demmler site is now “Pad Ready”, well so is most of the National Tube site and not a peep about the garbage incinerator/Power generation plant anymore.
What happened to the Great Garbage Incinerator idea?
And now we face the garbage collection crisis. Since it seems that no major player in business, that employs a significant number of people seems to want to locate or relocate to McKeesport why don’t we welcome all the “Not in my backyard” business to locate here? We have already started the beautiful “Welcome to McKeesport” scrap yards located under/near the 15th Ave. and Mansfield bridges, I am not to criticizing these businesses and I say “Thanks” since they provide a livelihood for our residents.
Since it seems that the state is going to “Lease” (sell off) the turnpike to a foreign company and the moment this transaction occurs the completion “Mon Valley Expressway” is to become a dead project once again leaving McKeesport high and dry with access to the outside world for business opportunities.
We should then investigate and try to lure the garbage incinerator to our city “Tooting” the fact that the location is ideal for garbage transportation to the site using the Railways and barges that already travel past the site. Aren’t these two modes of transport the main reason that the steel mills first settled into our area in the first place?
Just Imagine we could become that large star on the map that all trash haulers would come to, trash from the whole Nation generating free electricity for all to use.
Tesla would be proud!
Cox's Jimmy - July 24, 2008
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