Priority Waste works to address concerns about transition

CLINTON TOWNSHIP — Priority Waste’s massive acquisition of GFL Environmental’s assets began on July 1. With such a large change, hitches are inevitable.

According to Matt Allen, who is the company’s director of public relations and government affairs, Priority Waste took over operations in 73 communities and for 70,000 subscription customers in five counties across southeast Michigan July 1.

At the July 22 Clinton Township Board of Trustees meeting, resident Michele Tucker said her recyclables had not been picked up for three weeks.

“I’ve called Priority, and they say they’re going to send someone out and it’s going to be taken care of,” Tucker said.

Tucker said that calls to the township had not been fruitful, either. She said the township informed her that Priority said the issue was already resolved.

“It’s not being taken care of,” Tucker said.

Donna Wallace said the trash days prior to the changeover have not been adhered to by Priority Waste.

“We’d like to have clarification about when we should be putting our trash out,” Wallace said.

“We have all been concerned about rubbish pickup and the length of time it’s taken to change over to the new company and the equipment,” Clinton Township Supervisor Bob Cannon said at the meeting.

He said someone will respond to each resident’s concern. Following the meeting, Clinton Township Department of Public Services Supervisor Mary Bednar said the concerns had been relayed to Priority Waste. Tucker said, during an August 2 interview, that her rubbish had been picked up on the correct day. However, the recycling was collected later than usual, and the cans were scattered.

After the meeting, Clinton Township Treasurer Paul Gieleghem, who chairs the Refuse Disposal Committee, said that Priority is trying its best to honor the contract.

“I think that is a lot for any company to take on,” he said. “I was pleased that they added in some weekend days to catch up in our community, but I want to encourage residents to call the township and call their elected officials if they’re having issues.”

Gieleghem said this happening in the summer months made the lapses in collection even more glaring.

“Garbage in a bin starts to smell really quickly,” he said. “This is one of the core, foundational issues of municipal services.”

One of the issues specific to the township is garbage haulers walking up the driveway to pick up garbage cans for disabled residents.

“Those have probably been the biggest challenge for Priority,” Gieleghem said. “I’ve gotten quite a few of those calls.”

A large part of the blame can be attributed to a lack of serviceable trucks. According to Allen, there was an expectation that about 380 trucks were going to be coming into Priority’s fleet from GFL June 30.

“Over half of that fleet was non-road-ready, was non-serviceable — would not meet MDOT minimum requirements for operation or safety,” Allen said, referring to the Michigan Department of Transportation. “Those are the facts. We had to deal with it. … We knew what we needed to do to get them fixed to be put onto the road.”

“I think this all of this stuff takes time,” Gieleghem said

Even without that issue, Allen was not expecting a problem-free transition.

“The key part people need to understand is we told all the municipalities during the month of June, as part of the transition … that it would be about three weeks to clear away the backlog of everything that was left behind by the previous provider,” he said. “Some communities were experiencing two weeks of non-pickup, and in some areas, regretfully, they were up to five weeks. … Over half the fleet that was delivered was not serviceable. It needed to be repaired, which we have been diligently doing that — outsourcing for mechanics, fixing them … here and getting leased vehicles in here — substitution vehicles in order to bolster the operational needs to service all the communities.”

Aside from the approximately three-week time period that was anticipated to “clear the slate,” Allen anticipates it taking another 60 to 90 days to implement Priority’s technology on the trucks.

“This was going to be a very challenging month of July under the best of circumstances, and then when the trucks were not road-ready, it exacerbated the issue,” he said.  “We have cleared away a tremendous amount of backlog off the streets.”

Gieleghem said the Refuse Disposal Committee is set to meet in the near future, but no date has been set. He said, following this meeting, there would likely be an update from the committee at the next township board meeting.

“Our role is to make sure we hold our contractor accountable for performing up to the provisions of the contract,” Gieleghem said.

Allen also addressed wait times that people have reported when attempting to contact a Priority representative.

“I understand that in this day and age everybody wants everything within 15 minutes, so on, so forth, but when you’re dealing with 5,000 inquiries in a 10-hour day … sometimes it’s two, three, four hours before they can be answered, and sometimes the solution is already on the way, we just haven’t got to your subdivision yet or we haven’t got to your street yet,” Allen said. “So we’re dealing with the normal issues, and we’re dealing with (a) huge backlog. So we’re doing those two things simultaneously and fixing a very broken fleet, which we inherited in the purchase.”

Allen shared an optimistic perspective.

“A tremendous amount of progress has been made,” he said. “So what you would normally consider to be regular service without interruptions or delays and so on, that’s coming. We hear everybody, but people need to understand that we were the solution. The problem didn’t start on July 1. The fix started on July 1, and that’s what we’ve been executing.”

For more information, visit prioritywaste.com or call (586) 228-1200.

Gieleghem recommended that residents call the Department of Public Services at (586) 286-9300 if they have any issues with waste collection.