LAKEPORT – The Lakeport City Council last Tuesday approved a basic schedule meant to establish when its franchise hauler, Lakeport Disposal, will begin to pay its full franchise fee to the city.

In January 2004, the city enacted mandatory curbside garbage, recycling and greenwaste collection, with Lakeport Disposal as its franchise hauler.

The contract between Lakeport Disposal and the city calls for the company to pay Lakeport a franchise fee of 10 percent of its actual revenues. The council has, in previous decisions, forgiven part of that franchise fee in order to help Lakeport Disposal meet growing business costs.

Lakeport City Manager Jerry Gillham took to the council a matrix that has company rising to a full payment of the franchise fee by 2010.

Gillham said the effort is to create a phased-in process that contains some certainty for both parties. He said that Mayor Pro Tem Ron Bertsch, who has been on the city's negotiating team that has worked on the contract with Lakeport Disposal, wanted a more aggressive agreement.

Joe Butcher, who owns Lakeport Disposal, told the council he was OK with the matrix with one exception – he didn't agree with paying a franchise fee on the curbside recycling that the company picks up.

Butcher said that his company sells the recyclable materials to Lake County Waste Solutions (formerly Timberline Disposal), which then charges them to take Lakeport's greenwaste. Butcher said the result is a “wash,” which means the company makes no money to warrant a fee.

He asked the counsel to remove that fee as an offset “to the cost of doing business.”

Butcher and his sons, Craig and Lance, also told the council that within the last month they have been locked out of the Lakeport Transfer Station, and must haul trash directly to the landfill in Clearlake at a cost of about $1,000 extra per month.

He said that the county charges Lakeport Disposal $37 a ton to dump trash at the landfill, as opposed to $31 for other franchise haulers working in the county. “They're discriminating against us and the city.”

Meanwhile, Lakeport Disposal pays $48 a ton to dump trash at the transfer station, Lake County Public Services Director Kim Clymire told Lake County News late last week.

Butcher told the council at the Tuesday meeting that county officials told him the transfer station could be closed as long as five months.

Councilman Bob Rumfelt said he contacted Clymire about the transfer station, and was told it was shut down right now because of a broken ram, a piece of equipment used to compact garbage.

Rumfelt said that with the ram being out of service the transfer station's capacity has been seriously reduced, and the county is concerned that having Lakeport Disposal bring in large amounts of trash may tax its remaining equipment to the point of breaking as well.

Rumfelt said Clymire was willing to work with city officials to work out a solution. He said he was told that Lakeport Disposal is charged higher fees at the landfill because they don't pay the hundreds of thousands in fees to the county that other haulers do.

Butcher said his company can endure making the south county trash runs “for only so long” before it would be necessary to make other adjustments, including raising customers' rates.

The council voted unanimously to accept the matrix as it was presented, leaving in the curbside recycling franchise fee. Council members directed City Attorney Steve Brookes to amend the original contract with Lakeport Disposal to reflect the time frames and take care of any conflicting language.

Clymire explains transfer station issues

Clymire told Lake County News late last week that the transfer station's compactor is, indeed, down, and is being backed up by an older one, which has necessitated sending all the franchise haulers to the landfill.

He said it's believed the compactor's barrel has metal fatigue, and it's being taken to for a repair estimate. Replacing the ram could cost $250,000; to replace the entire compactor unit would cost more than $1 million.

Clymire said he's putting together a report to the Board of Supervisors on the transfer station situation.

He suggested that the county will be hard-pressed to justify the cost of big repairs for the station, considering that only 14 percent of the county's waste stream – 7 percent from franchise haulers, and 7 percent from self-haulers and contractors – is taken there. The rest of the county's waste stream, said Clymire, is take directly to the landfill.

Replacing the compactor, said Clymire, “won't make any economical sense.” The transfer station is being subsidized by the landfill's revenues, he added.

“If it was my private business, I'd shut it down, because it's losing money,” he said.

He added that the transfer station's main function is as a public service to community members.

On the issue of what the landfill charges franchise haulers, Clymire said South Lake Refuse and Recycling and Lake County Waste Solutions (formerly Timberline) are, indeed, charged $6 less per ton at the landfill than Lakeport Disposal.

The reason for the difference, said Clymire, is because Lake County Waste Solutions and South Lake Refuse and Recycling have – since 1998 – contributed $1.5 million to county waste programs, including recycling education, the hazmobile and some street construction projects.

The hazmobile, he added, is offered in Lakeport thanks to franchise haulers outside of the city subsidizing it.

Clymire confirmed Rumfelt's report, that he is willing to sit down with Lakeport officials to discuss the waste stream issue.

However, he said he had done that previously, in December 2006, meeting with Lakeport Council members Roy Parmentier and Buzz Bruns, and with Supervisors Anthony Farrington and Jeff Smith.

At that time, the county asked Lakeport Disposal if they wanted to contribute to the county's waste programs and they said no, said Clymire. As a result, Clymire said the Board of Supervisors voted against changing Lakeport Disposal's rates.

By hauling its garbage directly to Clearlake, Clymire said Lakeport Disposal recognizes an $11 per ton savings; at the transfer station the company is charged $48 per ton. Company officials told the council last week that the need to haul trash to Clearlake had caused additional expenses that ate up that $11 per ton savings.

Clymire calculates that the company will save $7,500 a quarter by going directly to the landfill. Even if they rack up an additional $1,000 per month in overtime and transport costs, Clymire said, that's still a savings of $4,500 per quarter.

Ultimately, Clymire said the county wants to see all customers receive a price reduction at the curb. Customers in the county, he said, currently enjoy one of the lowest garbage rates in the state.

E-mail Elizabeth Larson at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

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