Fesler-Butts: AJ requiring 1 trash service an 'HOA treatment'
Posted
By Art Fesler-Butts
I wrote a letter some months ago in reference to AJ's Republic Services mandate. We have lived in the AJ area since May 2001 and since then we have had four different trash collections pick-up companies.
The first one I do not remember the name but after living here for one year, Consolidated Waste bought out the old company.
Within a year of having CW, one day they came out and picked-up our cans. They did not leave or return with any other cans so when our collections day passed, we called for an explanation. They said that they have larger trucks than the company they bought out, they decided that our location was too bothersome for their drivers to maneuver in our area so without any notice, they cancelled our services.
Now, to be clear, we have four homes that are behind our house, and four homes next to us that would require these drivers to still have to make the same maneuvers in order to pick-up trash. But for some reason, only our home was chosen to be cancelled. No, we were never late on making payments and no we never did anything wrong to make these collections unsafe or that had violated any disposal rules.
We contacted the state to see if this was some sort of monopoly at play here by CW and the word was no, since there were other collections services in the area. At that time, Right Away was the only other service in the town. Even with their office located on Baseline west of Tomahawk they do not service our area. So, after a few months we found a start-up company but unfortunately they just went away. Lucky for us, Republic Services soon arrived and we were able to hire them.
Regarding CW, they never stopped collecting from our neighbors and to be nice to our neighbors we never complained further. Why we never complained is that we do not want to put our friends through this process of being cut off. Unlike our neighbors, we do not have a fence, and we actually let CW drivers and Republic Services back up onto our property to turn around and leave the area. To this date, CW still makes collections and they make their turn arounds on our property but to this date they never have bothered to thank us.
My concern and complaint against AJ's ridiculous law about making everybody use only Republic Services is that it is nothing short of an "HOA treatment" of AJ residents and quite possibly making AJ residents hostages to the whims of the City Council as well as Republic Services.
Having competing companies will at least prevent a monopoly situation. And who is to say that this City Council or any future ones are really going to keep an honest watchful eye on Republic Services to keep good faith with the citizens of AJ?
I personally would never live in an HOA and AJ with this action has created virtually a city-wide HOA. You residents of AJ who can vote for AJ city representatives should keep this in mind this coming election season.
You could be giving up your right to make choices for yourself; you can have services or not, and could choose what company you want. This issue is essentially what the National Health Care Act was on a national level.
