Jasper Talks Garbage in Town Hall

JASPER, Ga. – The Jasper City Council held a town hall in the midst of circulating rumors about the garbage collection services.

City Manager Jim Looney presented two outside proposals for the city to take over the garbage service from the city and details about those garbage services and what they would mean for the city.

One proposal offered street side service costing slightly less than the other that offered backdoor pickup.

Despite the offers, citizens quickly began asking why Looney didn’t include a third option for the city to maintain the service. Looney quickly responded saying that it was an option, but he was simply noting the outside proposals with set prices.

Overwhelmingly, the citizens present for the meeting as well as downtown businesses began saying that they enjoyed the people working for the county and felt their service was beyond compare. As such, suggestions began rising that they would be willing to pay more if it meant keeping the current service going.

Others complained about bringing in an outside service saying that restaurants downtown would have nasty and smelly trash on the sidewalk every weekday waiting for trash pick-ups whereas the current service provides backdoor pickup. Even with one of the outside proposals offering a similar service, citizens said the current workers have consistently responded to extra needs and requests without complaint, a service they highly doubted would continue with a commercial business operation.

Giving examples like times when a box was forgotten or something was missed, the city’s servicers readily returned to fix issues.

It was added that the reason these issues could be resolved quickly and easily was citizens direct contact with the operators. With an outside company, the city would become a “middle-man” between the citizens and the company with the city collecting the fees and paying the vendor. Likewise, the city would still be handling much of the trash issues as citizens would contact them with issues and they would contact the vendor.

UPDATE: Discussing the issue one week before their monthly meeting, the city saw no action on changes to a vendor or fees as of yet regarding the garbage service. As they continue discussions on the topic the item sits on the agenda for November.