The rollout of residential curbside collection under St. Johns County’s new provider has been a “catastrophic failure,” according to County Commissioner Sarah Arnold.
FCC Environmental Services Florida was supposed to begin collections as of Aug. 1 but as of Tuesday, Aug. 6, many residents were still waiting to see their trash taken away.
“We’ve had missed pickups in neighborhoods all over the county from Julington Creek Plantation all the way down to Hastings, and everywhere in between,” said County Commissioner Christian Whitehurst during the regular Board of County Commissioners meeting Tuesday.
Whitehurst gave the company a grade of F on yard waste, recycling and trash pickup.
Residents who did see their trash picked up complained of garbage being spilled in various places.
In response to calls from residents, the county dispatched its Road and Bridge workers to collect trash throughout the weekend. They clocked about 900 hours, which the county expects FCC to reimburse.
St. Johns County Public Works Director Greg Caldwell reported that a notice of default would be sent to FCC. The company would have seven days to cure the defect or the county would take action. If that seven days begins Aug. 6, it would expire Tuesday, Aug. 13.
In the meantime, county officials have been meeting with FCC twice daily to get answers and updates.
“They’d better get it right or we have provisions in the contract to move forward,” Caldwell said.
An FCC official, speaking at the meeting, promised, “We will fix this.”
The County Commission selected FCC as the top-ranked firm at its Dec. 19 meeting and approved contracting with it by a vote of 4-1, with County Commissioner Krista Joseph voting no.
FCC currently provides services to Polk, Hillsborough, Palm Beach, Orange and Volusia counties, as well as some cities, such as Palm Coast.
The $28,265,040 contract is for a period of seven years with an option for two five-year renewals.
Tuesday, Joseph proposed that the agreement with FCC be terminated and negotiations begin with the county’s former providers.
County Commissioner Henry Dean, calling the rollout “an unmitigated disaster,” put that into the form of a motion: that, should FCC fail to cure the default within the seven-day period, staff would be directed to terminate the agreement and seek bids for a replacement.
The motion passed unanimously.
If the seven-day period passes and the commission decides to move forward as stated in the motion, it would have to conduct another meeting and issue the RFP (request for proposal) to get bids.
St. Johns County has an estimated 114,000 residential homes that would be served by FCC.
