Council members Tyson Klukan and Carol Fenyes said a cost analysis will be done to consider private companies handling garbage collection and street sweeping in the future in Ford City.
Garbage collection and street sweeping may be done by private companies rather than borough employees in the future in Ford City.
Council is beginning to work on their 2020 budget and wants a detailed cost analysis of what it will cost for private companies to do the work.
“With the problems that we encountered over the winter with the lack of staff, and garbage collections interfering with the street work, we would like to go out for bid to see what it would cost us to outsource our trash collection,” Council President Carol Fenyes announced at Monday night’s public work session.
Council Vice-President Tyson Klukan clarified the Borough’s position.
“Being on the public works committee, and talking to our director of public works and our employees, I am looking at it from a cost analysis standpoint to see where we stand on the public side verses the private side. There are a lot of pros and cons of privatization. I think we really need to look at our dumpster fees. We are starting to look at our budget for 2020. Just looking at it from the amount of tonnage that we are collecting in our dumpsters, we are losing. We need to look at our dumpster fees if we continue garbage service. The rates – we are under here compared to Kittanning Borough. With other municipalities, we are average. The dumpsters really need to be evaluated.”
Fenyes said Council will be putting together a bid package that will go out to several haulers to see who will respond to it.
“In order to calculate that back against what we have budgeted, it’s an exercise to see if we can save money,” she said.
Fenyes also wants to consider outsourcing street sweeping duties to a private firm that can provide services Spring through Fall. Klukan is concerned about aging equipment.
“The street sweeper is about 20 years old. It has seen its better days. Outsourcing that might be a better use. We would not be paying on equipment. Street sweepers now start at $150,000. So we need to do a cost analysis. Without a doubt, we need street sweeping. It helps our storm water system and makes the town look clean. The guys are periodically going through the town and doing street sweeping. It will be interesting to see the cost of an outside source.”
Fenyes said union contracts with street workers would have to be factored into the discussions, since it has been past practice for union workers to fill garbage and sweeping positions.
“Can we make better use of our union employees to do street work rather than collect the garbage? It’s a point we need to discuss.”
Fenyes said it is assumed that the Borough would have to enter into a discussion with the union to facilitate these changes.