Item B: Ordinance Concerning Solid Waste Administrative Powers

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Why is the city singling out a specific category of heavy vehicle operator for this surcharge, when other heavy vehicles, such as those operated by EWEB, LTD, the school districts and local construction companies, would not be subject to the surcharge? The idea of a surcharge on garbage haulers to generate revenue for road funding was recommended by a committee of the City Council which spent several months in 2007 on the difficult task of identifying viable funding for street maintenance and preservation. The suggestion that all heavy trucks should be included is a common one that was, in fact, considered as part of the Council committee's review by looking at the potential for charging road fees to a broader group of heavy commercial vehicles operating in the city. The conclusion at that time was that the broader fee structure would be problematic for several reasons. The first concern is with regard to legal defensibility, in that if a fee were to be imposed as a requirement for operation of a heavy vehicle within Eugene, there is a high probability that it would be seen as a vehicle registration fee. Under current state statutes, only counties may impose a local vehicle registration fee. Furthermore, charging the fee to the broader group of heavy truck haulers was also viewed as neither efficient nor cost effective, as there is currently no practical way for the city to identify, track and assess the fee. Finally, there would likely be a disproportionate administrative cost associated with assessing a broad range of heavy trucks since there are no practical sources to obtain the needed data and bill for the fee. These are the primary reasons the Council committee determined that the broader heavy vehicle fee would not be feasible at this time. Staff believes that the 5% transportation surcharge on solid waste haulers is a fair and equitable way to contribute to funding for road operations and maintenance for a couple of reasons. First, there’s the fact that garbage trucks place a heavy load on nearly every residential street in Eugene on a weekly basis. In addition, this regular and heavy loading is unique to garbage haulers, as no other class of heavy trucks regularly runs on virtually all city streets. Most cities in Oregon levy some form of fees or taxes on garbage haulers and use some of that money for a broad range of general government purposes, including road repair. I don’t live in Eugene but am a resident of unincorporated Lane County. Will I also see my garbage rates increased as a direct result of this proposed Eugene garbage surcharge? The proposed surcharge is not a charge on garbage customers, but on the revenue generated by solid waste haulers who are licensed to operate in Eugene. Under this proposed ordinance, the solid waste haulers would be required to apply the surcharge only to garbage collection revenue generated within the city of Eugene. The Eugene surcharge would not apply to hauler collection revenues generated in other communities or in unincorporated Lane County. Solid waste haulers who do business in Eugene are already required to identify whether the property being served is within the Eugene city limits, so the garbage haulers should have the ability to bill different rates to their customers, depending on whether those customers are in the city or not. It should be noted that the City of Eugene does not regulate rates, billings or hauling services outside the city limits. What’s the connection between this surcharge on garbage collection fees and the condition of city streets? How is it fair that the amount of garbage I produce impacts the amount of surcharge likely to be included on my garbage bill? One of the underlying premises of this fee is that it would be assessed against solid waste hauler fees to better reflect the physical and financial impact that their operations impose on city streets as a result of heavy hauler vehicles running weekly on nearly every street in the city. The surcharge would be assessed on the collection revenues of garbage haulers on the premise that their heavy vehicles cause significantly more damage to city streets than do other categories of lighter vehicles and run largely on local streets, which do not hold up as well under heavy vehicle use. The surcharge also represents fair compensation for private use of the right-of-way, which is a public asset upon which haulers rely to deliver their services. 2