New Bedford Waste Services General Manager speaks before the Mashpee Board of Selectmen on November 4.
MASHPEE – After months of contention, the Mashpee Board of Selectmen have approved a requested price increase from its solid waste removal contractor.
New Bedford Waste Services sent a notification letter to the town on November 21 indicating it would be implementing a price increase for 2020 under an Uncontrollable Circumstances clause of the current contract.
The town entered into a 10-year agreement with the company for the disposal of solid waste in 2015.
The company requested an increase in the tipping fee to $93.75 per ton for 2020. The tip fee for 2019 was $59.23 per ton and that price was scheduled to increase to $60.71 this year.
NBWS said in the letter that it would be adding a surcharge of $33.04 beginning in January for each ton of solid waste removed from the transfer station bringing the total cost per ton to $93.75.
The board rejected that price increase in November for solid waste removal and authorized the town manager to negotiate and explore other options.
The contractor’s General Manager Michael Camara told the board Monday night that the waste disposal market is in crisis.
Camara said the company is working with three different companies, or brokers, to dispose of the solid waste it collects from its contracted communities.
The waste will be bailed into specially designed bags and transported to West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Ohio and Michigan.
“That’s because we don’t have anywhere to dump in Massachusetts,” Camara said.
The company will pay for disposal what it is billing the town.
“There is no money being made by my company,” he said. “You’ll get copies of our bills. We are not making any profit.”
Camara said his main concern tonight is to make sure that residents in the community aren’t impacted.
Discussions began between town officials and Camara after NBWS notified the town of a tip fee increase in August. An original letter said the tip fee cost would increase to $75 per ton for the remainder of 2019 beginning in October.
The town rejected that proposed increase in September and Camara attended a Board of Selectmen meeting on November 4 to discuss the current market situation.
The board and Camara had agreed to negotiate an amendment to the agreement during the November 4 meeting.
There were no negotiations and town officials felt blindsided by the November 21 letter stating the 2020 increase to $93.75
On Monday, board members expressed dissatisfaction with the communication from New Bedford Waste Services over the last few months.
“When we had you in last time I thought what came through loud and clear was a desire for us to have a negotiated conversation as opposed to a series of demand letters,” said Selectman Chair Andrew Gottlieb.
“And the next thing you do is send us another letter asking for something different and more. Frankly, it left me feeling like you are kind of tone deaf to what we asked you to do.”
The board envisioned a conversation directed through the town manager.
“In terms of moving forward, you can’t behave like this with us again,” Gottlieb said.
Selectman Thomas O’Hara showed empathy for Camara and NBWS and said the issue of solid waste disposal is not just local, but nationwide.
“I don’t want to put anyone out of business,” O’Hara said. “Nothing was done wrong by our contractor.”
Gottlieb agreed with O’Hara about the current market situations.
“My complaint is less about the price, because I get the context and this price is not dissimilar to what was discussed by other towns,” Gottlieb said. “I don’t like the process and I don’t like the way you conducted affairs with us.”
Selectman John Cotton agreed with both Gottlieb and O’Hara.
“It’s a major concern. We are very sympathetic to the understanding, but the communication could be much better,” he said.
The new rate is locked in for 2020.
Gottlieb also asked Camara if the company would come back looking for a higher rate to subsidize other contracted communities refusing to pay more.
Camara said the company would walk away from any community unwilling to pay the new rate.
“I have no alternative,” Camara said. “I cannot cover the difference.”
He said there are 12 communities under contract and he believes all of them are willing to pay the higher rate.
Camara said he is dealing with multiple brokers and states for disposing of the waste in case one of them decides they are going to increase fees.
“I don’t want to be in a position where all of a sudden I am coming back and saying this state is causing a problem and it is going to affect the pricing,” Camara said.
“I’m trying to put together a program where the town’s trash has a place to go and it is not disrupted. That is my focus.”
ABC Disposal Services Inc., which is the parent company of New Bedford Waste Services, planned to handle recycling and municipal solid waste at a Zero Waste Facility it constructed in Rochester.
The process would have included creating fuel briquettes with materials that could not be recycled.
Those briquettes would have been sold to biomass plants in New Hampshire, but the state discontinued issuing renewable energy credits causing the plants to shut down.
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