Thursday, April 7, 2011

Sacramento Bee: Leaf Pickup Costly for Sacramento City

Costly leaf pickup targeted for change in Sacramento

Published: Wednesday, Apr. 6, 2011 - 12:00 am | Page 1A
In this city of trees, The Claw has become something of an endearing mascot.

For slightly more than 12,000 families – most of them living in Sacramento's older neighborhoods – the metal contraption swoops by once a week and gobbles up the leaves and grass trimmings left in front of their homes.

But with more people opting to place their clippings in waste bins, The Claw has become an expensive animal for City Hall to maintain. And as a result, changes are afoot.

The City Council moved Tuesday toward placing a measure on the June 2012 ballot that, if passed, would allow the city to require use of green waste bins – City Hall's cleaner, cheaper rival to The Claw. The measure would seek to repeal 1977's Measure A, which prohibits the city from requiring the bins.

The council only discussed the proposal Tuesday and would still need to vote to place the measure on the June 2012 ballot.

At the same time, the council wants city staffers to explore charging more to those who use The Claw and scheduling the pickups with less frequency. As it is, even those who have bins get Claw service eight times a year.

Those who opt to have leaves and other yard waste picked up exclusively by The Claw – that's actually what the Department of Utilities calls the machine – already pay $3 more per month than the 103,787 customers who stuff their trimmings in bins.

City officials love the bins not just for the financial and environmental impacts. They say you never know what you'll come across in a pile of leaves on the street.

Dog poop was one example Councilwoman Sandy Sheedy provided. "Everybody (uses green waste bins) and they don't complain about it," Sheedy said.

Years ago, thousands more used The Claw. And when they did, the charges for that service offset the cost of running the machine. Not anymore, city staffers say.

In order to cover the cost of unleashing The Claw onto city streets, one of several things would need to take place, according to a staff report:

• Those who use The Claw and opt out of green-waste bins could have their monthly charge raised from $13.71 to $40.

• The city's battered general fund budget – which pays for cops, firefighters and parks – could chip in $3.8 million. The city faces a $40 million deficit for the upcoming fiscal year, so that idea was dismissed right away.

• Claw collections could be reduced from weekly to every month.

• Collections could be reduced to every other week and the fee raised to $25.

This has been a sensitive issue around City Hall for months, even years. Tuesday's hearing lasted nearly an hour.

When the city started offering green waste bins seven years ago, some "thought it would be a disaster," Councilman Kevin McCarty said.

Calls flooded into some council offices in recent weeks about the future of The Claw.

"It's something we've gotten used to doing in this city," Councilman Darrell Fong said of the practice of dumping leaves in the street.

According to a map in a city staff report, a vast majority of the streets where The Claw prowls are in midtown, Land Park, Curtis Park, the Pocket and east Sacramento.

Maybe 75 homes use The Claw in North Natomas, where many trees are too young to wreak havoc.

City staffers hear a lot in defense of The Claw, but some messages are heard more often. For some people, it's tradition. The Claw has been working in Sacramento for nearly 30 years, though laws forbidding the city from requiring lawn waste bins date back to the 1940s. For those limited by space, a third waste bin for lawn trimmings just doesn't make sense. For others, especially the elderly, it's a matter of convenience; it's a lot easier having a machine pick up your leaves than bending over and doing it yourself.

And for Roger Fong, who has lived in Sacramento for all of his 69 years, it's something even more.

"It's a birthright," he said.

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