March 28, 2024

‘Change is coming’

Waste collection with Jim’s Sanitation begins in October

The color is going from green to brown.

That’s the new color the garbage and single-stream recycling receptacles residents of Osceola are going to be receiving by the end of the month.

Waste Management will do their final collection pickup and haul its receptacles away the week of Sept. 23. During this time period, Jim’s Sanitation will be delivering and distributing new receptacles for its waste-collection contract with the city.

“The change is coming, and we just want everybody to be ready for that, and be prepared, especially when the receptacle change-out occurs,” said Osceola City Administrator/Clerk Ty Wheeler.

Bins — plural

Jim’s Sanitation has brown bins. The brown bin with a brown top will be for garbage, and the brown bill with a yellow top will be for recyclables.

Wheeler said Waste Management will most likely follow its regular waste-pickup route during its last contract week, and then, quickly follow that up with the pickup of the receptacles.

“There might be a possibility where folks have a new set of receptacles from Jim’s and the old stuff from Waste Management, but it will be just for the week,” Wheeler said.

If problems should arise with the changes, Wheeler said for people to contact city hall.

The contract for Jim’s Sanitation begins the first week of October.

Staying the same

The waste pickup days will remain the same for everybody, even with the change of different providers.

Everything regarding bulk item pickups, garbage tags for additional garbage and appliance-sticker program will remain the same.

“It’s just really going to be with a different color bin,” Wheeler said.

Recycling pickup will occur every other week. All the single-stream recycling information will be shown on top of the brown bin with the yellow lid.

“It’s everything that we’ve been able to recycle before, plus cardboard and glass bottles, and then, of course, the aluminums and paper and plastics.”

The first week of recycling pickup will be the week of Oct. 7-11.

Wheeler said it would make more sense to give people time to fill up their recyclables bin.

One size

There will only be one size of garbage and recycling bins — 95 gallons. This is comparable to Waste Management’s large-size bin.

For the garbage and recycling bins, there will be only one rate — $16.78 per month. This also includes a semi-annual, clean-up day add on.

“Administratively, it’s far easier to track and maintain one size of bin versus three. We had had several issues with the three sizes where folks were being charged either for a large and they didn’t have one or vice versa,” Wheeler said.

Utilize recycling

He added, there is the hope, someday, single-stream recycling will be such a success that the different size of garbage bins will become more easily available for usage.

“This is so much easier now than it has been to recycle,” Wheeler said. “You just throw it in. There’s no sorting. It’s just almost like throwing something in the garbage — just with the recyclable material.”

Wheeler said he wanted to emphasize the city’s desire to “up” the recycling utilization.

“With the curbside bins that we have now, we weren’t recycling close to half of what Corning was recycling, or what we’d been told Corning recycles using the single-stream bins. And, they’re not even half our size,” he said.