Coastside Scavenger Denied Nine-Year Contract Extension, City Council Requires RFP

At the November 10 City Council meeting, Coastside Scavenger asked for a nine-year contract extension, bypassing normal procedures for putting out an RFP (request for proposal) and bidding process in which all waste haulers submit written business proposals. The Council voted 4-1 to require an RFP. We need to thoroughly review what's out there and what we can get for the best price possible. By independent audits, we have the highest waste hauler fees for the lowest levels of service in the entire county. For reference, here is the City Council AGENDA

DOLORES DE CABEZA

Comments

[todd bray]

Elisa,

Pacifica doesn't compost like SF does. Pier 92 in SF sees a lot of recycling/composting/grease recycling and tallow production from the SF waste stream.

If Pacifica switches waste haulers, we may start curbside composting like SF.

[Elise]

I live in pacifica, any way to get a green compost bin at my house like they have in San Francisco?

[Mark]

This is fantastic news. I am really hopeful that we can find another company to replace Coastside Scam-angers. In addition to their poor service, their practices of illegally assessing fees for such things as your garbage can being "too heavy" have made many Pacificans angry. Perhaps the most important issue to the city of Pacifica is their unwillingness to share their financial information with the city when it was well known that they were becoming insolvent and the city was concerned about them going bankrupt.

[Summer Rhodes]

I hope our next vendor will recycle all the plastic items-- some have been returned by the current vendor. Suggest that next vendor create and manage a compost for the City of Pacifica. The benefit there would be twofold:
1) Even more recycling of materials instead putting them into landfill
2) Dirt! good for all Pacifica gardens!

[Lionel Emde]

Bravo!
This frequent critic of the council is most pleased at their critical thinking skills in denying this ridiculous gift to a company that has gouged us endlessly.
Full-on disclosure.

[Peter Loeb]

City Council voted 4-1 last night to go to RFP. Cal Hinton was opposed.

[Lynn Schuette]

I remember a great column Paul Azevedo wrote nearly 10 years ago about recycling and Coastside Scavenger. I think it merits another look. Thankfully, his family still maintains his website even though he died 4 years ago.

So... to those that remember: a blast from the past. To those who never knew or forgot: you're in for a treat. Paul was a man of many opinions. I enjoyed his flair for nailing most things right on the head and wonder what he would make of the Coastside Scavenger no-bid contract (did it pass?)

May 19, 1999

An Open Letter about cardboard

Mr. Louis Picardo
Coastside Scavenger
2305 Palmetto Ave. Pacifica, CA 94044

Dear Mr. Picardo:
At the risk of raising my blood pressure and blowing a gasket or two, I must respond to your latest flyer on recycling. You demand I buy and use my own twine or expensive fiber tape, and use more of my valuable time dealing with trash than I already do, to tie up bundles of the cardboard I donate to your profit-oriented company, or Coastside Scavenger will not pick up what I leave out for you on trash day. If I refuse to flatten and tie it in bundles, you say you won't recycle the cardboard I leave for you.

I think you're a fine fellow. I have nothing against you. You contribute to local charities. You participate in local service organizations. You shop locally. However, it's not my intention nor is it my goal in life to use my supplies and especially my labor as part of a community effort to make you rich. If a cardboard box stuffed with cardboard is not sufficiently secure to meet your requirements, I will mix it with garbage or burn it in the fireplace, rather than recycle it. If you want me to use twine for your benefit, you should furnish the twine. I refuse to spend my money on twine to increase your profits. Also, my time is worth at least $21 an hour, yet you make no offer to pay me for the time required to tie and bundle the cardboard which you sell at a profit. If it takes me five minutes a week, or 20 minutes a month, to flatten and bundle cardboard and gather my recyclables for your benefit, that means I'm donating at least $84 worth of my labor to you each year. If you were a charitable organization, or if I had stock in Coastside Scavenger, I might feel good about that, but you're an entrepreneur whose goal is to make a profit. Nothing wrong with profit! That's what business is all about. But you're not going to increase your profits from my free labor if I can help it!

Grocery stores find waste cardboard a major profit center. I assume you do as well, yet you refuse to pick up my cardboard if it's not tied up like a Thanksgiving turkey.

There's another alternative. Since you have a virtual monopoly on picking up trash in Pacifica, offer any diligent man or woman with a truck who's willing to do the work the right to pick up loose cardboard from your customers. They do all the work. They make all the profit. You don't have to bother. I suggest you allow them to pick up aluminum cans as well. That will remove a "burden" from your back, and it will give someone else a good income. Another alternative might be to throw open Pacifica's garbage contract for competitive offers. Very likely there's someone else willing and able to clean up Pacifica, do it better, and charge less money than you do.

Another scavenger organization might even restore the monthly safety valve you used to offer, where trash was brought to a couple of places in town by local residents on a Saturday. Hundreds of cars lined up every month, proof this was a needed and wanted service, yet Coastside Scavenger arbitrarily stopped doing it, and with no advance notice.

Paul Azevedo, The Reactor, has been sharing his opinions with fellow Pacificans since 1975.

[Cynthia Montanez]

Wait, what? 3 years and $150K to write an RFP? Where do I sign up for this? I write them all the time for my professional life. I never get 3 years. If I'm lucky, I get a month, mostly I get a week.

I think if they are serious about this, they should put it out to bid. It is the responsible thing to do, it won't take 3 years or $150K to write the RFP. It's something our City Attorney should be able to have her staff update from the last time it went out. They could probably do an internet search to see what other jurisdictions have done and use that information as well. It should take a month and there should be no costs to the taxpayers.

[Lance]

I would suggest that we all look at the big picture. We are recycling at a rate that exceeds the states expectations and we have our own recycling yard. Anyone on this stream been there and see what you can recycle rather than add to land fill? Try finding another town that allows a ten gallon discount can. Let's all be carefull. You think the big boys will pick up Fog Fest garbage for free? What about the beach clean-up days? You think they'll be there to gather the trash, take it to a local recycle center, sort it, FOR FREE!! Sometimes we get so caught up in giving it "to the man" that we shoot ourselves in the foot. Compare the services we get, all of them, with what BFI or other garbage companies offer. It's not fair to compare other cities with a local waste hauler that has a stake in the community.

[Frank Siciliano]

Now that Mr. Hinton, shameless apologist for Coastside Scavenger, is retired from the Council, is it possible for the Council at last to revisit this cozy relationship with Coastside and possibly choose another vendor?

It's nice to support locally owned businesses--and Coastside definitely is one. But if the business is corrupt, there's no need for anyone to support it.

[Lionel Emde]

"An independent auditor’s report completed in April 2007 warned of financial trouble at Coastside Scavenger (CS): "... under existing circumstances, there is substantial doubt about the ability of Coastside Scavenger Company to continue as a going concern (as of) July 31, 2006." The same report calls into question Coastside Scavenger’s refusal to open the books on its sister company, Seacoast Disposal Co. A complete financial picture of CS was "not reasonably determinable" unless Seacoast’s books were looked into."

This is from my article "Where's the Money Going?" which appeared in May 2008 and can be found posted in category Coastside Scavenger on the left sidebar of Riptide. I recommend it to readers of Riptide who might be curious about what the last audit of CS revealed.

I have to laugh that Mr. Hinton is one of the "negotiators" on this unformulated latest proposal, he would like nothing better than to hand a long-term gift to this company.

A Request For Proposal (RFP) is an absolute necessity for the protection of all parties concerned, ESPECIALLY the ratepayers. A complete audit, including the sister company Seacoast Disposal is also a must.

[Lynn Schuette]

Can we start an on-line petition to request the City put out an RFP? In economically trying times, especially, it seems prudent to do the due diligence to make sure residents get the fairest deal possible. Who knows, maybe we might even be able to save some money or get better recycling?

[todd bray]

An RFP could be very beneficial to Coastside. They may come out the big winner. But we as a community deserve to know what's out there and what if anything is available as an alternative.

The things to watch out for during Council deliberations are the franchise fee's the city gets and AB939 compliance. Whatever the outcome of an RFP, I'm sure the city will want the same income from it's waste hauler and the same if not better service at the same if not lower cost to us the citizens.

It's time to start going to Council meetings again.

[Steve Sinai]

What I found amazing was that on page 43 of the agenda, it says it will take three years and $150,000 in consultant fees just to write-up an RFP and evaluate submissions for garbage services. Why does always take so long, and cost so much in consulting services, to get even the most mundane things done in this town?