Herald-Tribune

Absolute garbage. Truckloads and truckloads of it. Worthless to most of us — except to two companies that haul it away. Together, they could collect $140 million in fees from Manatee residents and businesses over seven years.

The Manatee County Commission is to decide Tuesday what to do when the current eight-year contracts with garbage haulers Waste Management and Waste Pro expire on Sept. 30, 2016. Each hauler has an exclusive franchise area in the unincorporated county in which it provides curbside service.

Those contracts allow renewal for another seven years, which is precisely what the county administration recommends and most commissioners favor.

“I still have yet to have a complaint about our current haulers,” Commissioner Carol Whitmore said when the commissioners scheduled today's public hearings about the contract renewals. “I don't see any reasons to change.”

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