Haulers Believe 2-Tiered Trash Fee Plan Stinks : Garbage: Proposal would raise local rates 54% but charge out-of-county agencies less. Officials say they have no choice.

Cleaning out your garage? It could cost you twice as much to leave that tattered sofa at the dump. Run a gardening business? Expect to pay 50% more to dispose of lawn clippings. Own a home? Prepare for a bigger trash bill.

Fee hikes are never popular, but these are especially controversial; they come as bankrupt Orange County tries to raise money by enticing out-of-county trash haulers with cut-rate prices, some almost 50% below what local haulers pay.

The proposed two-tiered system is being blasted as discriminatory and unfair. In some cases, a pickup truck carrying concrete and wood from a home construction project in Irvine could pay more than a Los Angeles trash hauler carrying a ton of refuse.

“It’s just really outrageous,” said Madelene Arakelian, owner of South Coast Refuse in Irvine, who is seething over the prospect of paying $35 per ton of garbage as out-of-county haulers negotiate contracts for as low as $18 a ton. “It’s different strokes for different folks.”

County officials weathering the complaints say they have no choice. The fee increases help the county recover the cost of operating the landfill system, but more important represent the only new source of revenue in the financial recovery plan. If successful, out-of-county trash could raise up to $22 million annually, they say.

“No one is happy about this, I’m certainly not pleased with this,” Board of Supervisors Chairman Gaddi H. Vasquez said. “But what is the alternative? Do we just give up that revenue?”

The board voted in May to raise the so-called “tipping fee” for local trash haulers from $22.50 to $35. That 54% increase is expected to raise homeowner trash rates by $24 a year, officials say. The board meets Tuesday to decide whether to raise fees on passenger cars and flat-bed trucks. In the coming weeks, it is expected to endorse formalized contracts for out-of-county trash haulers.

It all adds up to Orange County residents and businesses paying more than ever to get rid of their refuse.

The disparity could drive out some business or lead to illegal dumping, critics say. It also might backfire by encouraging creative ways to get around the fee, admits Stan Tkaczyk, vice president of Rainbow Disposal in Huntington Beach and a member of the county’s Integrated Waste Management board of directors, which reluctantly backed the price changes.

*

Local trash haulers are likely to begin comparison shopping for landfills outside the county, which may be forced to drop their rates to match Orange County and thereby steal some hometown business, he said. Some local haulers also might try to save money by signing side contracts with the out-of-towners to carry their trash, he said.

“Even I have to say that if someone knocks on my door and makes me an offer I can’t refuse, I’ll have to think about it,” Tkaczyk said. “This can really add up.”

Critics say it angers them most that county officials are raising fees after they promised they would not rely on taxes to get the county out of bankruptcy and after voters overwhelmingly defeated Measure R, a proposed half-cent sales tax increase.

“Instead of cutting government like they should, our county fathers haven’t learned a thing,” fumed Lloyd F. Shaver, head of Lloyd’s Nursery and Landscape Co. Inc. of Costa Mesa. “They don’t call anything a tax . . . but I say if it goes to the government, it’s a tax.”

*

The debate over fairness clouds the issues, said Cymantha Atkinson, spokeswoman for the Orange County Integrated Waste Management/Environmental Management Agency. Importing out-of-county trash and fee hikes are two separate issues, she said.

For years, the county had one of the lowest gate fees in the area and hadn’t raised the prices since 1991, she said. But revenue has decreased in past years with the success of recycling and other waste management programs, leaving the county to subsidize the high cost of running its landfill system.

The county was mulling over the increases weeks before the Dec. 6 bankruptcy, Atkinson said. As for importing trash, she said, the county makes no excuses. Trash haulers from neighboring counties, who also must pay the cost of transporting their garbage over long distances, simply won’t pay $35 a ton.

“If the bankruptcy had not happened, there wouldn’t be a proposal on the table to have the differential fees,” Atkinson said. “But it comes down to market forces. . . . You can either come away with the benefit for the county, or you can say no, we want an equitable situation where everyone pays $35 a ton, and of course you’ll have no revenue from outside the county.”

On Friday, the county finalized negotiations with San Juan Capistrano to use its landfill for the new imported trash. In exchange, the county will take steps to lessen the impact on the community, such as building a sound wall and a road that circumvents neighborhoods.

The use of that city’s landfill means that the county ultimately could sign up to $22 million worth of contracts a year, which would help pay back the nearly $1.7 billion it lost on a risky financial investment strategy.

But that still leaves Shaver worried about how to pay his $3,000-a-month dumping fees without running the risk of losing customers if he raises prices.

“I know the logic to the county’s position, I see the logic,” he said. “But this all means my competitor outside the county can either bid the same job cheaper or make a bigger profit than me. And the county’s behind this. Well, I just don’t feel very well about that at all.”

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Trash Plan

The only new source of revenue in Orange County’s bankruptcy recovery plan comes from attempts to lure out-of-county trash haulers. The plan could yield as much as $22 million per year by offering low prices at the same time it raises fees on local haulers and proposes fee hikes for individuals:

* Board of Supervisors in May approved a 54% dumping fee increase. County haulers now pay $35 per ton, up from $22.75. Estimated annual increase in trash service payments for Orange County households: $24.

* Passenger cars and trucks currently pay $5 and $10, respectively. Proposed minimum new rates for vehicles carrying less than 860 pounds of waste: cars, $10; trucks, $15.

* Cars and trucks carrying more than 860 pounds will be charged $35 per ton on a prorated scale. Truck drivers also will pay a surcharge of $5 per ton for hard-to-handle materials, such as concrete.

* County currently negotiating contracts that would charge some out-of-county haulers as little as $18 per ton.

*

Source: Integrated Waste Management

Researched by RENE LYNCH / Los Angeles Times