Elmhurst residents can expect to pay about 4 percent more for refuse and recycling services beginning April 1 after all but one City Council member Monday approved a report from the city’s Public Works Committee setting new rates for the year.
The new rates reflect a 3.7 percent increase from the city’s waste hauler, Republic Services (Allied Waste) and a six cent increase in the city’s administration charge levied on all service users.
Residents using 65-gallon toters will see their monthly rates rise from $17.12 to $17.76, while residents using the larger 95-gallon toters will pay $23, up from the current $22.17.
Those rates include new rates from Republic, now starting the last year of its 5-year contract and a monthly city administration charge of $1.61.
City officials say that administration charge, paid by all users, covers two leaf pickups in the fall and street sweeping in addition to the costs of administering the program. Administration costs for the program in the coming year are expected to total about $308,000.
Ald. Michael Bram cast the only vote against the new rates, complaining that the increases, including the level administration fee, have the effect of charging those using the smaller toters a higher price per gallon of refuse. Bram noted that when the new Republic contract began four years ago, the shift to toters to allow mechanized handling eliminated the 32-gallon containers smaller households, including many seniors, had used.
“I believe we’re penalizing people for doing the right thing,” he said.
The difference is about three cents per gallon, from 24 cents a gallon in the 95-gallon size to 27 cents a gallon for the 65-gallon size.
But Ald. Dannee Polomsky applauded the shift to smaller toters, saying more recycling has led to more people choosing the smaller refuse toters and thus to less garbage.
With Bram voting against the report and with Ald. Michael Honquest and Mark Sabatino absent, the remaining 11 aldermen voted to put the new rates in place April 1.
Rates for yard waste and refuse stickers will remain unchanged, as they have for the last two years, at $3.25 each.
Graydon Megan is a freelance reporter for Pioneer Press.
