Meet your new garbage hauler: Elite Waste Disposal.

Barring any breakdown in contract negotiations with city staff, the Jordan-based company is set to secure a contract to pick up trash at roughly 1,350 residences throughout its hometown.

Both the local company, which moved to Timberline Industrial Park almost two years ago, and the Jordan City Council, which earlier this month narrowly voted to award the contract to Elite instead of Waste Management, are taking some risks in the deal. The contract will come before the council for final approval next week, City Administrator Ed Shukle said, and should it pass, Elite’s service will start after Sept. 1.

Waste Management has well served Jordan residents for 14 years, but Troy and Stacey Schuette, Victoria residents who own and operate Elite, said the contract is a three-way win.

SAVING MONEY

Jordan residents will save about $42 a year on their garbage hauling fees, Troy Schuette said, and the Schuettes are vowing to provide improved, local customer service.

The monthly base price per resident, though, is dimes less than what Waste Management offered.

To pick up 32-gallon carts every week, Elite will charge $9.77 a month, compared to Waste Management’s offer of $9.97.

For 64-gallon carts, Elite charges $12.50, compared to Waste Management’s offer of $12.75.

For 96-gallon carts, Elite charges $15.30, compared to Waste Management’s offer of $15.61.

All of the services offered by Elite are the same as those offered by Waste Management, Schuette and Shukle said.

“We’re trying to make it as seamless as possible,” Shukle said.

It’s just that the garbage trucks and carts will be black and red, not green and gold.

“That’s all we want to change – the truck and the color of the cart,” Schuette said.

If there are comments or concerns, even the owners of the company are accessible.

“Customer service – we take pride in that,” Stacey Schuette said. “That’s what we do.”

A CITY REQUEST

When Elite constructed a new 3,000-square-foot office building and a 6,500-square-foot shop in one of the city’s two adjacent industrial parks, Troy Schuette asked the city about its residential refuse collection.

This year, the city put out a request for proposals (RFP) that will save Jordan Public Works employees’ time on two citywide cleanup days, as well as supporting a business that pays taxes in town and – hopefully – keeping residents happy.

Garbage will be picked up every week, recycling every other week. Part of the city will be picked up on Wednesdays, the rest on Thursdays.

There will be Christmas tree pickup, as usual.

For about 150 residents who take advantage of a per-bag pickup, the service will continue. Residents may purchase garbage bags at Radermacher’s Fresh Market, and Elite will pick them up, just as Waste Management did in the past.

Also, as part of the RFP, Elite agreed to run the citywide cleanup days without city employees. Past cleanups required full days of work from all five Public Works employees and cost the city some overtime pay.

Four times a year, Elite will pick up yard waste that has been bagged.

During the process of deciding which RFP to accept, the city is not required to take the lowest-priced bid. So the city staff looked at bids from seven companies and took Waste Management’s experience and Elite’s locality into consideration.

City staff recommended that the council approve Waste Management, citing the fact that Elite has never done residential refuse collection.

After a contentious and confusing discussion on Sept. 21 and the receipt of more comparable information from the two finalists before an Aug. 4 meeting, a motion to award the contract to Waste Management failed 3-3. Councilmembers Jeremy Goebel, David Hanson, and Sally Schultz voted against the motion. Councilmember Mike Shaw was absent from the meeting.

Then, the council awarded the contract to Elite in a 4-2 vote. Councilmembers Barry Ullmann and Jeanne Marnoff voted against the motion.

Reassured by Schuette that Elite would be able to handle the workload and number of accounts and would maintain the quality of service residents expect, Mayor Ron Jabs voted for his second of the two motions.

Those who voted for the motion talked about supporting local businesses.

Schuette is a go-getter who is admirably persistent, Shukle said. “Obviously, he’s paying taxes in town. He’s got a nice building in the industrial park. … People want to see business in Jordan. We know he’s here. He’s not fly by night.”

UP AND COMING

And Elite, of course, wins because it is going to expand its business during a time when the down economy.

As it grew, from its beginnings on the 10-acre plot of land in Shakopee where the Schuettes lived for a decade, the company’s owners had a contract to pick up residential refuse (aka municipal solid waste) in mind all along.

Fourteen years after the company started, its 2-1/2-acre site in Jordan houses eight of Elite’s 11 trucks with room for expansion to 20.

The company rents 530 dumpsters to roughly 400 customers.

“Roll off has been our mainstay,” Schuette said.

In Rogers, Elite has a satellite office that focuses on roll off.

To accommodate the residential refuse pickup, the company purchased new bodies to add to two of their chasses and carts to be kept at Jordan homes.

Running the operations won’t change much, Schuette said. Elite will take the waste to the same place it takes its dumpsters, but residential waste goes into a separate pile, because it’s a different kind of trash.

Elite also does some work with new construction, demolition, and re-roofing.

Mathias Baden is the editor of the Jordan Independent. He can be reached at editor@jordannews.com.