Gardnerville sanitation workers make their rounds through the Grant Avenue Walmart parking lot on Nov. 29.
Photo by Kurt Hildebrand.
A resolution increasing rates for garbage service in the Town of Gardnerville is scheduled to be discussed by board members on Tuesday.
The 35-percent increase amounts to an $8.51 increase for a standard 90-gallon residential tote and $10.42 a month for a standard 2-yard commercial bin starting July 1, 2025.
The new monthly rate for a tote would be $32.83 and $40.19 for a commercial bin. The rates would include a new 4-yard commercial bin.
At the Nov. 5 meeting, Town Manager Erik Nilssen detailed the cost reasons for the increases, which were prompted in part by landfill fees going from $300,000 to $400,000, the doubling of the cost of a new trash truck to $600,000.
“General inflation is the rest of it,” he said.
The only public comment at the meeting where the town approved moving forward with the increase was from resident Julie Duda.
Duda pointed out that the letter to business owners didn’t state the percent increase.
“I didn’t see where it was stated anywhere the actual percent of increase,” she said.
The business letter listed the current and potential costs but did not state the actual increase.
Duda also protested that trash service in the town is mandatory, something she brought to county commissioners during public comment at the Nov. 17 meeting.
Duda told town board members that the rate increase would cost town residents and businesses $1 million over two years.
She urged the town to conduct an audit, among other things.
“More work needs to be done, including an expense audit, which is essential,” she said. “A 35-percent increase is not reasonable and should not be approved.”
Trash service in Gardnerville is an enterprise fund, which means the money it raises and spends must deal specifically with trash collection.
“The money from the Health and Sanitation fund can only be used to cover costs,” Nilssen said. “We’re covering our bases. We’re not making money on the fund.”
Nilssen said the town’s rates are presently lower than Douglas Disposal’s and 10 percent lower than Minden’s.
“We will be more for a time,” he said. “But Douglas Disposal does an annual rate increase. They will increase next year and the year after that. This is a four-year rate increase. I suspect we won’t need one for six to seven years.”
Both Gardnerville and Minden have mandatory trash service, but not the rest of East Fork, which is served by Douglas Disposal under a franchise agreement with the county.
Nilssen said he mailed out 250 letters to every business customer in town and none came back with any objection.
“No one raised any objection,” he said.
Town Board members accepted the business impact statement and set the Dec. 3 meeting for the second reading.
Should the new rates be approved, it would be the second increase in two years after the town implemented a two-part rate increase on Jan. 1, 2022, and on July 1, 2023, that combined increased rates by 20 percent.
