Some county residents are reportedly feeling a little dumped on because their garbage has not been picked up in several weeks and Waste Pro USA, the county's rubbish collection contractor, has been conspicuously lagging.
So, on Monday, the Sunflower County Board of Supervisors met with representatives of the company to discuss the problem and what could be done to get the garbage collectors to pick up the pace.
However, after hearing Waste Pros’ response to the allegations of neglect, District 3 Supervisor Ben Gaston put forth a declaration and seemingly issued an ultimatum.
"As far as I am concerned, you failed in your contract and if you do it again, my suggestion is we get another vendor, which we can get," he said.
Gaston asserted that the company should have figured out there routing and other issues by now and should be working overtime to satisfy the constituents of Sunflower County.
Waste Pro Municipal Marketing Director Lori Cate explained that due to COVID-19 related issues plaguing the company, they have been unable to get the job done properly. "Because it's constantly changing from one day to the next. We may think we have a perfect plan in place and then something changes the next day," she said.
Cate further explained that Sunflower County is not an isolated situation. "The problems that we've been experiencing here, we've been experiencing everywhere across the board."
She said an assortment of circumstances have been developing at their various locations and the problem is not unique to Sunflower County.
She stated that new top-level people have been brought on board to address the service issues and then identified absenteeism and other situations involving drivers and helpers being out due to COVID-19 as the crux of the poor service complaints. "That knocked out your whole crew as far as trying to get garbage up," Cate said.
She stressed that they were actively hiring and trying to find drivers in an already limited pool. Cate stated that Waste Pro was not the only company that was dealing with worker shortage issues. She mentioned a company in Jackson that was short 22 drivers.
She said they are utilizing a variety of methods and modifications in order to get the garbage collected including rolling schedules and revising established routes.
She asked the supervisors to provide a list of “hot spots” where garbage has not been collected in recent weeks so they can go out and address those first. "We know that it's been a failure and we know that we've been impacted," Cate said, "So there's all eyes on this contract."
Gaston said, "My district is one of those who went without garbage collection for three weeks and I can tell you, my constituents aren't happy. If you ask me, you didn't fill the obligation of your contract."
Gaston stated that he had heard all of their comments regarding COVID-19 and other issues, but asserted, “If you haven't fixed your problem by now, something is wrong," he said.
Gaston also emphasized that the company should already have all of the data they need in order to determine whose garbage has not been picked up in the past three weeks and that it is not the supervisors’ job to give them a list of where they need to collect.
As a further indictment, Gaston also maintained that his initial calls to the Waste Pro’s office resulted in someone telling him that the trash would be picked up the next day, but several days later it was still there. Gaston said when he called at other times no one answered the phone. "And sometimes it was five times before they'd finally tell me, 'Well sir, we can't get to it,' if you can't fix something, tell me," Gaston said.
Waste Pro representative Joey Harris said, "We're going to get this fixed, no worries."
District 1 Supervisor Glenn Donald said that his constituents are also complaining and asserting that since their garbage is not being picked up they shouldn't have to pay. So, Donald indicated that he was going to make a motion that if the homeowners don't pay the county, then the county should not remit to Waste Pro, but there was never a formal motion made.
Donald asked if the garbage could be picked up this week from all residents, but especially those whose garbage has not been picked up in three weeks. He asserted that it should be done no matter who has to man a truck, even the manager. "If the ox is in the field on the Sabbath day, what you do? You don't leave him out there to die; you go get it; that's the Bible. So the ox is in the field now," Donald said.
Cate said that although they want to get the whole county serviced, they want to especially get the hot spots done first, those areas that have been missed recently. “We know it's been a bumpy road for the last three weeks,” she said.
President Riley Rice, District 4 Supervisor Anthony Clark and District 5 Supervisor Gloria Dickerson also complained that their constituents' garbage has not been picked up and they too were unable to get any answers from Waste Pro.
Dickerson said some of her constituents questioned if the county was going to continue with Waste Pro or get another contractor because they are not satisfied with the service.
Chris Lockwood, Regional Vice President, Waste Pro, indicated that they would be working weekends to rectify the service problems. "We have no problem doing that, getting caught up, we're going to do what we need to do to get caught up," he said.
He also mentioned the possibility of hiring someone from within the county to help identify all of the routes since the regular drivers and helpers are either out sick or no longer available.
No other action was taken; Waste Pro is due back before the board at their September 21 session to give an update.
