Home-grown company filling void left by Waste Management

July 29– A change of contractors providing garbage collection services for Savannah residents is leaving some Hardin County residents who live nearby but outside the city limits in the lurch.

Effective Aug. 15, citizens of Savannah should begin using the new blue containers being set out at households and businesses by Waste Connections, the new service provider replacing Waste Management.

Outside its soon-to-expire contract with the city, Waste Management has been providing household garbage collection services for a reported 60 or so non-city customers in the Savannah vicinity. Those customers have been told by Waste Management their service has been discontinued.

Hardin County chooses not to provide its residents with door-to-door household waste collection services.

Instead 13 mini-dumps or "convenience centers" were established more than 16 years ago to replace hundreds of unsightly and often overflowing Dumpsters along the roadsides.

County residents who had used Waste Management have the options of transporting their garbage to the dump themselves or finding another contractor willing to take on the necessary chore many view as difficult or unpleasant.

Elisha Morris said her Walnut Grove-based company, 74 Pickup, is in the business of taking out the trash for Hardin County residents "from Northshore to Milledgeville."

In operation since 2007, Morris said she started 74 Pickup to "help the elderly and the disabled. Every time I went to the convenience center there was somebody having trouble getting the trash out of their car."

About a dozen customers have been gained by the local company since Waste Management eliminated its subscriber service in Hardin County last week, she said, noting 74 Pickup advertises in The Courier.

"A couple of them were upset because apparently they didn’t get notice their service was being discontinued" and their Waste Management containers disappeared, Morris said.

Waste Connections is not willing to immediately expand its services beyond the city limits, according to Division Vice President Marty Dunkin.

"The best I can answer you, right now, is first off, that was not part of what we bid on. Our main focus now is to make sure we satisfy our new customer, which is the city of Savannah," he said.

Dunkin said that despite the loss of the city contract, Waste Management could "theoretically" continue to provide "subscriber" services outside Savannah if it chose.

But Waste Connections has not written off the potential side business, he indicated.

Dunkin said the company is investigating the possibility and "if it doesn’t cost us more than we take in, we’ll consider it."