Clinton Township penalizes Priority Waste for lapses in service

CLINTON TOWNSHIP — Priority Waste is getting some pressure from Clinton Township to honor the contract it took over from GFL Environmental Inc. on July 1.

The company will now have to pay out $50 for each unresolved customer complaint each day there is a lapse in service to the township. The $50 will go into the township’s refuse fund. This is allowed for in the township’s contract with Priority Waste, according to the township’s attorney, Jack Dolan. Following a closed session at the Clinton Township Board of Trustees meeting on Aug. 26, trustees unanimously approved the payouts from Priority Waste.

“I think this will be heard loud and clear by the company that’s serving our community right now,” Township Supervisor Bob Cannon said. “We want them to do well, we want them to succeed and we’re just trying to spur that on.”

The penalties for Priority Waste will go into effect Sept. 16.

In an interview following the meeting, Township Treasurer Paul Gieleghem, who chairs the Refuse Disposal Committee, said that he hopes money collected will help the township with the service in the future.

“Ultimately, we need to go out to bid for this service in March of 2025,” he said. “This might help us offset some of the cost increases that are likely if there’s not a more competitive market at the time when we go out for bid.”

Matt Allen, Priority Waste’s director of public relations and government affairs, said many of these issues should be addressed by Sept. 9. He said that by this date the technology used to monitor trucks and the online portal for customer complaints will be working. These things should help minimize unresolved complaints.

“We understand that in this political environment that the board of trustees chose to take that action, but the working relationship we’ve had with Clinton Township has been excellent,” Allen said. “The final stages for the technology will be done by Sept. 9.”

Allen said many adjustments during the transition have been made on the fly.

“We are flying the airplane and fixing the broken wing,” he said.

Gieleghem said he personally has heard complaints about wait times on the phone and had a half-hour wait time himself. He said the portal for customer complaints was supposed to be up and running for the township.

“They said the portal would be up and running when we did the assignment,” he said.

Gieleghem said township offices have been inundated with phone calls from residents about the service falling short. The township relays those complaints to Priority Waste and the company is supposed to contact the township when they’re resolved.

“We have not heard back from them,” Gieleghem said. “We know that they’re swamped, but we want to do this on the date that they gave us where they said they’d be up to speed.”

Allen said that once the monitoring system is in place, these complaints will decrease. He said this has been the case in other municipalities Priority Waste services.

“We know what we have been to and what we haven’t been to,” Allen said. “If there is a discrepancy because of the cameras, we have six to eight cameras in each one of the garbage trucks, our logistics driver coordinators can actually go in and look at it.”

Resident Dana Dugger sent C & G Newspapers an email detailing several concerns he had with Priority Waste including the condition of the fleet inherited from GFL, trucks leaking oil and questions about when the township’s Refuse Disposal Committee meets.

“The failure to effectively plan the transition further demonstrates a business taking on a task it was not properly prepared to accomplish,” Dugger stated in an email. “Ask the question. Is PW trying to position themselves to be the only option for residential trash service in southeast Michigan?”

Allen addressed the aging fleet that Priority Waste inherited from GFL, saying trucks are starting to come back after maintenance. He said there will be additional Saturday pickups to make up for where the service has been behind.

“It’s kind of hard to service 700,000 people with less than half the trucks you were expecting 60 days prior,” he said.

Dolan said the Refuse Disposal Committee is not subject to the Open Meetings Act. The committee does not have a voting quorum and only makes recommendations. These recommendations come before the Clinton Township Board of Trustees for a public vote.

Gieleghem said the penalties are just a way of getting the company to live up to the contract.

“We want to impose those penalties to make sure that we’re getting the responsiveness that we need,” he said.

Department of Public Services Director Mary Bednar echoed this in a statement.

“Transitions are always hard, so we have tried being reasonable with Priority to give them time to get up and running,” she stated. “Nevertheless, our residents deserve satisfactory service in accordance with our contract.”

Allen said the company has been working since it inherited the contract to make things right. He called it the “largest essential services takeover in the state’s history.”

“For a lot of people it’s fatigue,” he said. “Citizens are fatigued by the long process. Government officials and administrators are fatigued by the process, but we’re on this journey together.”