Reject public resource giveaway

Several times in the last 10 years, High Country Disposal (HCD), the garbage service for Bend, Redmond, and Deschutes County, has asked the Sisters City council to grant them a franchise for the trash collection in Sisters.

Each time the city council has declined.

Earlier this year, HCD again requested a franchise to collect Sisters' residential and commercial garbage. Our city council again declined. Subsequently, HCD "sweetened" their proposal. The council concluded that HCD's more lucrative offer at least required further consideration and our due diligence on behalf of the Sisters taxpayers.

That due diligence was completed last spring. It includes curbside recycling, except for glass and cardboard and, though financially more attractive than previous proposals, still falls drastically short of being worthy of the council's acceptance.

Although HCD is working on an updated proposal that the city council has not seen, I'll address the shortcomings of the proposal that we have seen and explain my opposition to the HCD franchise.

Accepting HCD's last proposal would be the worst public policy decision in the 10 years I have been on the council.

The city would be forced to give away a profit stream of over $7,000 per month! That's every month out as far as you can count. The $7,000 per month is after all the garbage hauling expenses have been paid.

The city uses this $7,000 per month - or about $85,000 per year - to defray labor costs and operating expenses in other operational funds, i.e., streets, sewer, water and general. If this profit stream disappears, the city could only absorb it for so long before taxes or fees would have to be increased to make up for these lost funds. It will have to be made up at some point. And guess who will make it up?

Granting this franchise is also a bad idea because elimination of the garbage service will result in less work for many of our city hall staff. However, there is no proposal to reduce wages to account for this reduced workload.

Sisters spent almost $560,000 of the taxpayers' cash (not including land) to build our new recycle center. HCD's proposal does not address how they would acquire it and pay back the taxpayers. In short, the city, being out of the garbage business, would essentially hand over to a private entity an expensive structure built with public funds!

The city administration makes much of the fact that staying in the garbage hauling business will require spending huge dollars on new garbage trucks, thus depleting reserves. If we were naive enough to buy a new garbage truck for $240,000 - maybe! But Sisters has never spent that much money for a truck. We have in the past, and could again, purchase a serviceable used truck through the state surplus for about one-third the cost of a new piece of equipment.

We have collected our own trash for decades and it has served the taxpayers well, particularly in the financial sense. Granting HCD a trash-hauling franchise would be a mistake of major proportion.

If you agree with me, please let my fellow councilors and our city manager know your opinion. Thank you.