On Oct. 16, the Minnesota Supreme Court confirmed what I've suspected about the St. Paul citywide garbage collection contract: There is no easy out for the city; the contracted money must be paid regardless of the outcome in November's city election ("Yes vote or no, city must pay haulers," front page, Oct. 17).
Those advocating for repealing the ordinance maintain that, once the ordinance is undone, trash collection will revert to the way it was and the city will not have to fulfill the terms of the contract. The likelier result is that, after a long and protracted court case, the city will not only have to pay the trash haulers the amount guaranteed in the contract, but the legal and court fees as well. That total will leave the city far less money to fund our schools, maintain roads and sidewalks, develop affordable housing and produce other social goods.
Candidates for City Council who are campaigning to tear up the ordinance and the contract need to explain how they intend to cover the costs involved in voiding the contract and implement a different system of trash collection without raising taxes or cutting services.
Incumbents seeking to retain their seats should demonstrate some lessons learned in implementing the unified trash collection system. First, they owe city residents their apologies for prioritizing the concerns of the various trash haulers to the near exclusion of those of residents. Second, they should describe changes they will make to the current system so that it better serves all the residents of our city.
Trudy K. Cretsinger, St. Paul
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Those who criticize St. Paul's decision to go to one trash hauler per street per week lose sight of the "common good."
My city, Mendota Heights, is a microcosm of the problems St. Paul is trying to correct.
Mendota Heights has seven licensed haulers. Each week 10 trash trucks pound down my four-block street. These 44,000-pound behemoths, belching harmful emissions, contribute to the premature damage of my street for which I received a $16,000 assessment for repairs/improvements.
Then there is the money/cost factor. Each truck must travel 25 miles round trip to dump its load. These trucks average about 5 mpg. By having two trucks instead of 10 trucks, we could cut costs by 80% and thereby lower household hauling fees.