Haulers miss 5% of Dumpster pickups under new contracts

Garbage and recycling have piled up at hundreds of Seattle apartments, condos and businesses in recent weeks due to missed pickups, prompting Seattle Public Utilities (SPU) to warn its trash-hauling contractors to improve service or face big fines.

The glitches follow the switch to new 10-year waste-hauling contracts, which started March 30.

Since then, CleanScapes and Waste Management, which divide the city between them, have skipped 5 percent of pickups at apartments, condos and businesses with dumpster service, according to SPU officials.

Lael Hoppler, SPU's customer-service director, called those failure rates "unacceptable" in a news release.

Unless the utility sees steady improvement this week, Hoppler said the companies could face fines of up to $500 per day per missed dumpster.

Service at single-family homes has been much better, with a 99.5 percent pickup rate, according to SPU.

Most missed pickups were by CleanScapes, a local company that has never before managed a big-city contract.

Waste Management, a giant national hauler, also has had problems, but its pickup rates are much better, according to SPU spokesman Cornell Amaya.

CleanScapes, which got its start promoting "dumpster-free" alleys in Pioneer Square, beat out the larger, more established Allied Waste to win the $32 million-a-year contract to pick up trash, recycling and yard waste in Northeast and Central Seattle.

CleanScapes President Chris Martin attributed many of the problems to "bad data" on dumpster locations and drivers not being given keys or access codes to get into locked dumpsters at apartment and condo complexes. In some cases, he said, building managers haven't responded to multiple requests for access.

Martin said his crews have been working hard to fix the problems and were making "substantial progress."

"It's embarrassing," Martin said. "One of my favorite restaurants, right by my house. We flat out missed that guy's recycling."

Susan Robinson, Waste Management's director of public-sector services, said the city has been pleased with the company's performance and praised it. She said the company has been meeting almost all of the city's goals.

"We strive to eliminate any missed services to our customers, and when we do we can circle back quickly and correct those mistakes," she said.

George Sidles, a solid-waste manager for SPU, said the utility is confident the situation will improve quickly: "Both companies are giving this issue an awful lot of attention."

SPU has dispatched inspectors to shadow the contractors and help deal with some of the problems.

The new contracts changed the routes and collection days for many of SPU's 165,000 business and residential customers. Food-scrap recycling was made mandatory, and yard waste is picked up weekly, instead of biweekly.

Prices for garbage and recycling service were also raised by about $7 to $9 per month for residential customers.

Jim Brunner: 206-515-5628 or jbrunner@seattletimes.com