Some residents upset with trash service in KCK

Some residents are upset with the Unified Government’s trash contractor on delays in picking up trash in Kansas City, Kan.

Residents of one Leavenworth Road midtown neighborhood did not have trash picked up for three Mondays in a row, said Lou Braswell, executive director of the Leavenworth Road Association.

“This week they did make it here,” she said, “but they picked up what they wanted to pick up.”

Some bagged trash did not get picked up, only trash in a barrel with handles was picked up at some residences, she noted.

On the south side of Leavenworth Road, the trash wasn’t picked up near 55th and Webster, Georgia and Yecker, and a lot of side streets were missed between 52nd and 59th, she said.

She said she noticed that Deffenbaugh formerly had two men to a truck plus the driver, and now there are fewer people on a truck.

Residents are unhappy too, with many residents turning to private companies to collect and dispose of their trash. In other states, this works well, as companies such as Southern Rubbish will handle the collections themselves – thus eliminating the public service.

Braswell called Deffenbaugh’s phone number, plus her UG commissioner and the 311 UG information number. Usually, the trash was picked up the next day after her call, she added.

Braswell said she told the person who answered the trash company’s phone that there was a contract, and she had no choice but to pay her BPU bill, which has the trash charge on it. “He said, ‘Ma’am, I can’t give you a credit.’ I didn’t ask for a credit.” She just wanted them to pick up the trash.

Deniese Davis, who lives in the Leavenworth Road area, went around to neighborhood residences and asked people this morning if their trash was being picked up.

There were many that had not been picked up Monday, their normal trash day, but most were being picked up on Tuesday.

South of Leavenworth Road, whole blocks were missed, she said.

“We’ve been missed,” she said. “It’s been hit and miss for the last three weeks.”

After she made a call on Tuesday morning, the trash for those neighborhoods was picked up later in the same day, she said.

She asked what happened to the former workers for Deffenbaugh, and she learned that some of the current workers are new to these routes and formerly worked routes in Missouri.

She also heard that trash pickup problems seemed to be common in different parts of the Kansas City area.

Davis said she went to a Livable Neighborhoods meeting where the mayor asked everyone to call 311 every time a problem came up with trash service, in order to document it. The documentation could be leading up to further UG negotiations of some kind with the trash collection company. Today, Mayor Mark Holland posted on his Facebook page that the UG wanted to know if residents’ trash service was delayed for even one day, asking residents to call the UG’s 311 number to provide information.

Residents are wondering if it is the end of an era for good trash service that many took for granted.

“I always felt very lucky,” Davis said, “we were the only community I know of that whatever you drag to the curb they’ll take, short of building materials and rims.“

Now that seems hit and miss, too, from what she’s hearing from residents, she said.

Deffenbaugh Industries had the contract with the UG, and that company was sold to Waste Management. The UG’s contract was through the next three years.

Earlier this month, on June 7, the UG sent out a news release to the media about trash service. According to a UG spokesman, public works department employees went out around the community that week to help Deffenbaugh crews with trash pickup that was missed.