GwinnettViews
What are your feelings Gwinnett?
Gwinnett County (BOC) cuts ties with Gwinnett Clean & Beautiful. Really!?!?
May 6th
GDP Article by Camie Young: County cuts ties with Clean and Beautiful
Gwinnett Clean and Beautiful staffers have moved out of the county annex building in Lawrenceville and are operating out of the Recycling Bank of Gwinnett, where the nonprofit has a lease until 2020, Wiggins said.“It does not impact our mission or the board we have in place,” she said, acknowledging that all phone calls on graffiti eradication by inmates, garbage hauler complaints, roadside clean-up or illegal dumping are all being referred to the county.
Anyone want to know who owns the property the GCB leases? Yep you got it the County (BOC). So did you really cut ties?
Advanced Disposal Services sues Gwinnett County and GCB for $40 million in Federal Court.
May 5th
This will be interesting to see played out over the next months and months. This one will drag on forever. The BOC tried to wash its hands of GCB because they knew this would never end pretty.
On Nov. 7, 2008, Gwinnett Clean and Beautiful awarded contracts to Advanced Disposal and Waste Pro, two Florida-based firms that submitted low bids for residential trash pickup. Six other haulers that were serving Gwinnett residents were to lose their service areas beginning Jan.1 when the new plan was to take effect.On Dec. 18, 2008, Gwinnett Superior Court Judge Michael Clark granted a temporary preliminary injunction, ensuring that for now the county’s garbage service for unincorporated residents will remain as-is.
Now the BOC has hired a consulting firm to start all over. As bad as the OLD-NEW plan was it amazes me how the BOC thought the people the GCB/BOC signed a contract with would just go away quietly.
Advanced Disposal alleges that the county has taken no action to mitigate the damages caused by its actions or those of Gwinnett Clean and Beautiful or to amend the county’s solid waste ordinance to allow the new plan to be implemented as per the contract…
Christian Mills, general counsel for Advanced Disposal, said the company believes filing suit is the “most direct and just means” of getting relief.“While we find it unfortunate to have to resolve this issue in court when administrative processes are readily available to resolve the matter, we cannot allow the county and (Gwinnett Clean and Beautiful) to ignore their fiduciary obligations to the citizens of the county and their contractual obligations with Advanced Disposal,” Mills said.
Seattle, WA Consulting Firm to get $131,000 to study trash in Gwinnett
Apr 21st
AJC Article by Patrick Fox: Gwinnett plans solid waste study
Gwinnett County commissioners approved a $131,000 study to redraw the county’s failed solid waste ordinance — a measure that generated a firestorm of protests and a rash of lawsuits last year.The action follows a series of meetings held by a citizens panel to collect public input and make a proposal that would increase residential collection, encourage recycling and possibly reduce truck traffic in neighborhoods…
R.W. Beck is expected to make its recommendations based on a set of tasks:
• Review past, current and enjoined ordinances.
• Establish criteria based on counties with comparable populations and demographics.
• Conduct a series of public forums and surveys to gauge community priorities.
Gwinnett Commission Chairman Charles Bannister said the commission has not discussed the issue in detail, but he expects the board to focus on state mandates and the judge’s objections when a new ordinance is crafted.
Good thing they haven’t discussed it in detail especially since they think they need to spend 131k to make a plan. Does that money come from the rainy day fund or petty cash? Goes to show the MBSCT was nothing more than a pretty show.
A Must Read posted on Mack Perry’s Blog about the MBSTC Recommendations
Apr 7th
Mack Perry Blog: Gwinnett Trash Committee Recommendations
Posted by mack on April 7th, 2009
Link above is fixed.
Hello all:
It has been a while since I last wrote but I have not given up on this crusade.
This says it all about what Mike Beadreau is all about and what this group was organized for, “window dressing.”
I can only think that this is the beginning for more information to follow.
I would like to thank Mack for his time and effort in trying to do the right things for us in Gwinnett but the politician behind this is less than honest in his intentions.
Mike Beaudreau is a grandstanding politician and only cares about his own personal views and nobody elses.
The BOC is this county does not care about us who elected them into office. We need to let them know how we feel about this travesty that the trash committee was lead right into.
Don
County is going to name “New” Waste Consultant
Apr 2nd
Today the county is expected to name the consulting firm it has chosen to complete its solid waste program assessment study. And it won’t be the same one used by Gwinnett Clean and Beautiful last year.
According to Mack Perry, who served on Commissioner Mike Beaudreau’s trash committee, nobody on the 15-member citizen’s board had a clue about the county searching for a consulting firm.“It was unbeknownst to us,” Perry said. “Not a soul was aware of it.”
He also said the report of recommendations prepared for the Board of Commissioners to consider in drafting a new solid waste plan has been completed, and would be released to the public as soon as the commissioners had a chance to see it.
“The public needs to know that we as a committee listened,” he said. “And there were differences of opinion on lots of things.”
Perry said two things he took away from the five meetings were that the people want a choice with regard to who their garbage hauler is and don’t want garbage charges appearing on their property tax bills.
No decisions yet on the Trash Plan. County may defer any decision for this year.
Mar 15th
So what does this mean? Since I read the article yesterday I went back and forth on my thoughts. Maybe they are taking their time to get it right. Then I laughed at that thought because of how bad the Old-New Plan was screwed up. Maybe they have have no idea where to go next. Seems plausible especially if you have no real new ideas and the Old-New Plan was screwed up. Maybe they are still trying to figure out how to spin all the other great ideas lately like the stadium and the new budget and the raise in water rates and they just don’t have time for this and of course they really know that the Old-New Plan was screwed up. So maybe they defer and delay and maybe people’s anger and concern will be directed in another direction like the stadium and the budget which in all honesty we can do nothing about. We have heard here on this site “it’s just trash what’s the big deal.” The big deal is the way our county is being run. The big deal is the decisions that are being made just don’t make sense. The big deal is the county thinks they know what is best for the citizens and from the things they have done lately do you really think that is true? The big deal is the erosion of my choices. Today it’s trash what’s next?
Let’s revisit the last meeting of the MBSCT:
What we need to think about is who knows better what is best for us at the end of the day? The BOC? Really? When the MBSCT was created we asked more than once for them to be sanctioned. However, after attending the last meeting of the MBSCT I am pretty sure I don’t want this group to be speaking for me. I had high hopes for this committee that they would come away from these meetings listening to the public and come up with ideas that would make sense and be some ideas that the BOC could agree was in the best interest of the people who live here Gwinnnett County.
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My only issue with this one is that this is one more thing the government is mandating like we don’t know that picking up trash is important. Most of us are going to have trash service whether the BOC tells us to or not because we don’t want the trash to stay at our house. I am sure I am naive in thinking most people want trash service whether at their home or their business because they want their trash picked up. I really find it hard to believe that because someone does not have trash service that automatically makes them an illegal trash dumper. Again I am probably naive but I hope we live in a better county than that.
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Where is the free choice of the residents in this? Again to hear the MBSCT say we need to go to a “One Hauler One Neighborhood” sounds great in theory but who is getting to choose the hauler. Not the residents. Yes I am happy the local businesses get the opportunity to bid again and stay in business but if I were them I would be wary of this approach as any. Why? Because what’s to stop them from getting undercut on their bid by bigger companies with more resources. What’s to stop one company from having more than area? What will that do to service? According to Commissioner Beaudreau having a SLA (Service Level Agreement) will keep performance high. What will keep the service at a high level is my ability to fire someone if I don’t like their service. Seems to me a business listens a lot better when you hit their pocketbook than if you hit their customer service line. I heard more than one trash hauler say this in the meeting. The ones that were there have no problem being held to that standard. For most that’s how they got where they are today
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This is how you stop illegal dumping? Nope, sorry but if you think making something mandatory that the majority of the people use anyway is going to stop illegal dumping then you are losing it. The people who dump illegally won’t give a rip and will continue to do what they do. If you really want to stop illegal dumping then get serious about stopping the people who do it. Don’t interject the government more in our life and punish us because the majority of the county do what we are supposed to and a small percentage don’t.
The findings of the MBSCT were supposed to be presented today. In the end it will be interesting to see what their findings end up being. Will things change? There was nothing on the agenda for the working session of the BOC. Where will the county go and what decisions will the make at the end of the 120 days?
2009 Budget Passes—Property Taxes increases to follow
Mar 4th
I would like to suggest you go out to the county website and watch the meeting from yesterday that was taped. The budget was not passed with ease and the 4-1 vote was very interesting. We have been critical of Commissioner Beaudreau but yesterday he at least tried to stand up and say the budget wasn’t right.
“It would have kept us solvent, and we would have had a balanced budget,” Beaudreau said. “It’s regrettable that politics got in the way.”
We just wish he had been able to come up with alternatives before the meeting so that MAYBE some of the other members the BOC would have listened. However that did not happen and Chairman Bannister distanced himself from Commissioner Beaudreau on the budget just like he had done already with the Trash Committee.
Commissioners did approve a call by Bannister to move capital projects, including the opening of a Grayson police precinct, into future years. Beaudreau said the moves seemed politically motivated since three of the five projects were in his southern Gwinnett district.
MBSCT final meeting was held 3/2/2009
Mar 3rd
Monday night was the final meeting of the MBSCT. There was a time for the committee to listen to and ask questions of the haulers. All of the haulers echoing the need for free enterprise and competition as a way to not only keep prices low but a way to make sure customer service is kept as a very high priority. They all would love to get to a “one hauler one neighborhood” situation but they all believe this should be done through free enterprise not through government dictation. These items were the same from the haulers as they have been from the citizens over the previous 4 meetings around the county. With the findings of the MBSCT expected to be presented to the BOC around the March 17th time frame it should be interesting to not only see what the findings and recommendations are but to see how the committee actually publishes them.
Being there and hearing the interaction of a few was very educational as far as this group goes. To me where the meeting got interesting was in the “closed” session that occurred after the “open” public session. There were 4 important things that stood out to me in this discussion.
- The majority of the MBSCT want each of us to have mandatory pickup with limited exceptions. The exceptions would have to be defined and I guess you would have to have a written note from someone somewhere to qualify for it otherwise you have to pay for the trash service
- The majority of the MBSCT are in favor of moving haulers into districts and allowing them to bid on the districts. IE: There would be 8 districts and a hauler could bid on one or more of these districts. This would allow for “one hauler one neighborhood” thus allowing for less traffic on the street. One thing I did not understand is how this allows for residents to choose. Does this allow for the pricing to be set in the bids through the county instead of through the residents themselves?
- The majority of the MBSCT agree we need more recycling but the question I have is how do you encourage it. One of the haulers mentioned they are partnered with RecycleBank but have not implemented the program due to the uncertainty of the the current situation.
- The majority of the MBSCT believe the only way to make sure that all of us residents are toeing the line is to put the trash bill on our tax bill.
One other thing that was mentioned by the Committee Chairman was that he hoped that the documents the members were passing around via email would not end up on websites like this one. As you can see we do not have any of the documents but we hope those documents would be released for review in due course. Even though they are not elected officials it would seem to me that if the goal of this committee in the beginning was to be an open and citizen driven group that they would not care if other citizens saw the documents as well.
AJC article by Patrick Fox: Garbage panel recommends mandatory pick-up
The committee’s draft, finalized after two hours of public comment at the Gwinnett Justice and Administration Center in Lawrenceville, calls for establishing exclusive service zones for waste haulers. The panel was divided over whether to allow more than one hauler per zone, but it did suggest that such a program would need to be phased in over time.
The panel leaned heavily in favor of mandatory trash service for all residential properties, although it provided for exceptions, such as business owners with trash service at work and property owners who can prove a residence is unoccupied.
Members were close to unanimous in advocating increased recycling options and establishing some authority to monitor customer complaints.
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