Committee for a Better Environment

Approved: February 01, 2017 Pay as you Throw/SMART Committee Meeting December 7, 2016 Present: Suchitra Balachandran, Janis Oppelt, Matt Dernoga, Bob Stumpff Absent: Gemma Evans, Chris Nagle Guests: Sheryl DeWalt, contract secretary The meeting started at 7:30 pm. 1. Reviewed the August and September meeting minutes which Dr. Balachandran submitted with corrections. Ms. Oppelt made a motion to accept both the August and September minutes with corrections. Mr. Dernoga seconded the motion. All in favor; no opposed. The November meeting minutes were reviewed. Ms. Oppelt made a motion to accept the minutes. Mr. Dernoga seconded the motion. All in favor; no opposed. 2. Mr. Stumpff reviewed his research based on the questions asked by the committee: a. Prince George’s County cannot undertake the additional task of billing College Park residents for trash; the City of College Park would have to set up a billing structure, but, at the moment, there is not enough staff to handle billing. A person would have to be hired, and Mr. Stumpff estimates the cost would be $80,000 (for salary and benefits). b. The current property tax rate in the City of College Park is 33.5c per $100 of property value. A 1¢ reduction in the property tax rate would reduce the amount of revenue by $230,000. c. Greenbelt residents pay $70 per quarter for a weekly pickup of trash and special trash, yard waste, bulk, leaf and vacuum service, and recycling. Greenbelt has an in-house staff to do the billing. d. Aberdeen covers tipping fee and taxes cover staff fees. Residents pay $1 per sticker per bag up to 42 lbs. The city removes trash, bulk, and yard waste once per week and has a billing department. Aberdeen has a problem with collecting revenue from stickers and may consider moving away from SMART. 3. Mr. Stumpff reiterated his previous concern about the increase in workmen’s compensation if bags were substituted for the bins currently used for trash. Dr. Balachandran clarified that the mode of trash pickup would not be altered if the usage unit were set to bags. While some jurisdictions used bins as the unit to determine the usage fee, others used bags as the usage unit. In College Park, for example, the three bins now available to residents would continue to be available to residents even if bags were used as the usage unit. For example, some residents may choose to use a small bin if they had less storage room, while others may choose to ask for two large bins. The number of bags they put into these bins would determine their final cost. Mr. Stumpff agreed that this resolved his concerns on workmen’s compensation around the use of bags.  4. A discussion followed on two financial options for a usage-based trash fee in College Park: either a) subsume a large portion of the public works budget into an enterprise fund payable via a usage-based fee or b) maintain the current budget structure and recover only a small portion via the usage-based fee that would be compensated by a lowering of the tax rate. It was agreed that the latter would provide maximum flexibility to the City as the usage-based fee system was implemented and evaluated. Given this decision, Mr. Dernoga pointed out that setting up a billing structure for the usage-based fee and hiring a full-time staff member was not financially advisable, and it appeared that the bag option would be most sound. 5. Discussion took place on enforcing current recycling rules. Mr. Stumpff stated that his staff documents all residents who do not correctly follow the recycling rules and leaves notices for them. Unfortunately, various members of City Council are pressing DPW not to give out notices and fines to residents. 6. The committee discussed “Measures of Success” for the program. A document listing these was shared with the committee, and these measures will be incorporated into the report given to the City. 7. The summary report for Mayor and Council should be finished by the end of January. Dr. Balachandran and Mr. Dernoga will work on the summary with notes from all of the SMART meetings. They will send an outline to the members for review and comment. 8. The next meeting will be on Wednesday, January 18 at 7:30 pm in the lower level conference room of City Hall. The meeting concluded at 8:50 pm. Respectfully submitted by Sheryl DeWalt, contract secretary.