The City of Hillsboro met on Tuesday, Aug. 2 where they followed up on Ordinance 1356 which they had previously discussed in the July 26 meeting. The Ordinance changes the trash rates and modifies the recycling service charge.

“Rates in the Ordinance were modified slightly based on the conversation at the Council level and additional input from the office staff. The base rate which all the other rates are derived from was increased from its current $12.75 to $14.75,” said City Administrator Matt Stiles.

The original amount was proposed at $14.66. It was increased by $.09 to make it easier to communicate to customers based on office staff feedback. The difference is .07% different than what was originally presented.

The recycling service charge to reflect the 50% cost for a second cart.

“The recycling service charge increases for commercial customers based on size of the recycling dumpster and frequency of the dumps. The previous structure had everyone paying $2.53 per month for recycling regardless of the volume and number of times it was dumped,” said Stiles.

Stiles explained that additional language was added for dumpster rentals. Rates are matched to commercial rates based on size.

He said, “The biggest change is the two-week limit, put in place to address a problem we have with customers holding on to dumpsters for weeks at time. We also updated the ordinance to reflect the

current process on bulky item pick-up.”

The proposed changes would produce an estimated $54,400 in additional revenue per year.

“The additional revenue should be sufficient to cover escalating costs and to make an investment in a secondary residential truck,” Stiles said.

Based on the publication timeline, billing periods, the need to change the backend of the billing

system, and providing advance notice to customers, the proposed rates would first appear on bills

sent out November 1. That billing period includes mid-September to mid-October.

The council approved the Ordinance.

In other business, the council:

n learned that in 2021, June was the second highest month of the year. Collections this year were nearly identical to 2021. Comparing year to year, 2022 remains 22% above last year and 35% above the rolling 5-year average.

“Based on the current trend, I anticipate total sales and use tax revenue combined to exceed $1,000,000 in 2022,” said Stiles.