With Jackson just days away from having no one to pick up its trash, a tentative settlement has been reached between the city council and Richard’s Disposal that will see the company paid and the trash picked up, according to an attorney for the council.
Richard’s had not been paid for the six months of work it had performed, and the company was threatening to end trash collection on Saturday, but, during executive session Thursday night, a majority of the council voted to allow their attorneys to negotiate a settlement of $4.8 million, Ward Seven Councilmember Virgi Lindsay said.
“A majority of the council agreed yesterday that we would authorize our attorney to negotiate up to $4.8 million,” Lindsay said.
John Scanlon, attorney for the council, said once that the council gave them approval, his negotiations with Richard’s began. To his knowledge, the agreement was formed over the course of one day.
The settlement is related to the lawsuit Richard’s had filed against the city, seeking payment for the services it has performed since it began picking up the trash in April. It is not an agreement to enter into a long-term contract, or a resolution to the legal battle over the mayor’s veto of the council’s no-vote on the current emergency contract that Richard’s is operating under. Despite the fact that the $4.8 million number matches what Richard’s was seeking, Scanlon said the settlement is not a recognition that the emergency contract is valid. That question will be decided when the Mississippi Supreme Court rules on the veto case. Under the settlement, Richard’s has committed to pick up trash in the city at least until that case is decided.
“Richard’s was seeking payment for six months under the emergency contract, which they believe is valid, which is for $808,035 per month. However, the city council has never recognized that to be a valid contract, and it is, in fact, undisputed that it’s never been voted on or approved by the city council,” Scanlon said. “So the City Council is relying on its inherent authority to just compromise and settle disputed claims. It’s not paying under a contract. It’s not paying for work that was completed. It’s simply settling and resolving the claim.”
Scanlon said that while attorneys for the council and Richard’s have drafted an agreement, it will ultimately be up to the magistrate judge who is presiding over the case to approve the settlement. That step could be completed next week, but both sides signing off will be enough to keep garbage collection going. While the agreement is not finalized yet, Scanlon said its tentative nature should not worry residents.
“It’s tentative, mostly because of the late hour at which, you know, this all came together. I mean, Richard’s didn’t make a formal announcement that it was going to withdraw from garbage pick up until just yesterday. And so, we’ve been working together with the president of city council, and the federal magistrate judge’s office, to do as much as we can in a single day, just to make sure, I mean the city council was committed to making sure that its citizens were still provided garbage collection services, and that’s really the most important thing to the city council.”
Though the settlement came together quickly, there were hints that one was possible before Richard’s pulled out of Jackson.
Following the more than two-hour-long executive session Thursday, councilmembers who have supported a competing bid from Waste Management committed to ensuring residents’ trash did not pile up, regardless of which company was performing the service.
“We went through a number of options and plans and will work with our attorneys for a settlement,” council President Ashby Foote said. “Hopefully, we can come up with a solution that works for everybody. We are going to work very hard to get this resolved in the next 48 hours.”
Ward Three Councilmember Kenneth Stokes, who has been one of the most vocal supporters of the Waste Management bid, said Thursday he didn’t care who picked up the trash come Monday, as long as it is picked up.
“I think the city council as a whole realizes the garbage needs to be picked up,” Stokes said.
After the council closed its meeting, Mayor Chokwe Antar Lumumba left. He immediately addressed the issue at hand, voicing his support for Richard’s.
“Councilmembers who put out their trash expect it to be picked up like the rest of us. They should approve the contract and pay Richards for what they have been doing,” Lumumba said
Councilmembers had thus far refused to pay Richard’s for the company’s work on the grounds that the emergency contract they working under is illegal since it has never been approved by a majority of councilmembers.
It is the latest chapter in the trash wars that have been fought between the council and the Lumumba administration. When Lumumba first ran for mayor in 2017, he promised a blind bidding process to award the city’s next garbage contract. What followed was multiple requests for proposal and emergency contracts. The latest RFP process ended with the mayor and city council at odds over which company had submitted the winning bid.
State law instructs government bodies to award contracts to the “lowest and best” bid. A majority of the council sides with Waste Management, whose bid without garbage bins scored the highest overall score. Lumumba sides with Richard’s, whose bid with garbage bins is the cheapest option, to the tune of $1.2 million per year, and is the highest scoring bid with bins. Over the life of the proposed 10-year contract, Richard’s bid is $12 million cheaper than Waste Management.
