Phoenix Public Works makes its case for raising trash pickup rates nearly 50% over 3 years

Phoenix residents may be paying more for their trash and recycling services starting this summer. The city’s public works department is asking the City Council and mayor to increase rates over the next three years.

Lorizelda Stoeller, Phoenix’s assistant Public Works director for the solid waste division, says her department’s services don’t get general fund money to operate, so they rely on the monthly rates. And those haven’t gone up since 2020.

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Phoenix Public Works Department recommends raising garbage collection fees by 50%

Ignacio Ventura

Phoenix residents may soon have to pay more to have their garbage collected. The city’s Public Works Department says the only alternative is a reduction in services.

Right now, city residents pay $37.32 a month for their weekly trash and recycling pickup, as well as bulk trash pickups and other services. Under the proposal city officials are considering, those rates would go up $6 a month this July, followed by another $6 a month next July and $5 a month in July 2028.

“We are not immune to the inflationary pressures that all of us are feeling as consumers. The operation has felt some significant pressures, particularly centered around the cost of our people, our trucks and our infrastructure,” Stoeller said.

As evidence, Stoeller points to the Garbage and Trash Consumer Price Index — yes, there is such a thing. It tracks the average prices paid by consumers for disposal services from 2020 on, and shows that increase at a little more than 5% last year, after peaking at more than 7% in 2023.

In practical terms, Stoeller says, that means a new garbage truck that cost about $330,000 in 2020 now costs around $540,000. And, construction costs on facilities the city owns have increased nearly 40% since 2020. Stoeller says that makes the need for more funding — and thus higher monthly rates — pretty urgent.

“We’ve pulled the levers that we can, like making our trucks last longer, not replacing them as frequently or pushing back a project to maintain some of that infrastructure. And we’ve reached the point where everything that we’ve pulled is not enough and so we do need to make an adjustment,” Stoller said

That adjustment could come next month, when the Public Works Department brings the City Council the results of an online survey it’s taking on the proposed change, as well as feedback from 10 community meetings it’s holding this month.

Stoeller believes the increased rates will bring the service to a healthy place.

Full conversation

LORIZELDA STOELLER: You know, we’re not in this to make a profit. We really are just covering the true operational costs of our operation. And we are also recommending an inflationary factor increase because it really is good practice for any business to take a look at the health of your fund. What are the economic conditions and the pressures that you may be feeling during that particular year?

And back in 2020, we did include a 2% inflation factor. And so our residents were experiencing a 2% increase every year. And the last one actually kicked in this January, in 2026. And that’s what brought us to $37.32. So that was a good forethought, but it just did not keep pace with those expenses that we were seeing, like that 52% increase in our trucks and 40% in our infrastructure.

So we are recommending to include that inflationary factor as well for the subsequent years — so through 2034 — and just allowing the operation to take a look at the financial health of the solid waste fund, you know, what’s going on in the world and economically and what inflationary pressures we’re feeling or not feeling.

And then we could make a decision: Do we need an inflation factor? And this would not exceed 5%. It really ensures the stability of the fund. And then also modest increase that our customers can fit into their lives, because these can be disruptive when they’re really large rate increases.

MARK BRODIE: Right. So am I hearing you correctly that the inflationary increase, would that be a yearly thing going forward?

STOELLER: Yeah. ... So after the first three years of that 6-6-5 increase, so starting in July 2029 through June 30, 2034 — so those years after — we are just asking for an annual inflationary increase if needed. So it would give us the latitude to really look and see, do we need an increase?

Because there may be a year that we’re fine, we don’t need it. But if the inflationary pressures that we continue to feel like we are and we have felt for the last six years, then it would give us that ability to incorporate, you know, or make an adjustment, like 1% or 2%, whatever we needed to just ensure that we were meeting our expenses.

BRODIE: OK. I know that there’s been some concerns raised on the council and elsewhere about the idea of what do you do about residents who maybe can’t afford to pay more for their trash collection.

What is the plan, if there is one, for how to handle that if people are maybe financially stretched and can’t afford it?

STOELLER: Yeah, we definitely are sensitive to that concern. I know affordability is top of mind. And so we are actually working really closely with our human services department. And our human services department, along with the water department, we contribute to what’s called Project Assist.

And Project Assist is a program that’s administered by our human services department. And it’s for these families that are struggling to meet, are, you know, make their utility payments. And it’s specific to city utilities — so your water, wastewater and your solid waste services. So right now that program has $1 million allocated to help these families in need, and that’s funded through the solid waste and our water and wastewater funds.

So with this recommendation, we are also committing that we can double our solid waste contribution to the Project Assist, so that bring up the total available in that fund to $1.2 million. So that could help more families. As well, the city does currently offer a program — which I don’t think a lot of our residents know — but the standard size of a garbage container, a curbside garbage container, is 90 gallons.

And that’s what you’re paying for, for $37.32 every month. We actually have a smaller can. It’s a 60 gallon container. So for families that can afford to throw one to two less bags of trash a week out because they’re great recyclers, they can save on their monthly bill, $3 a month. So that’s an option.

BRODIE: You mentioned that you’ve kind of done what you can to reduce costs. I wonder if this doesn’t go through, what happens?

STOELLER: At this point, if we are not able to get a rate recommendation, we will really need to look at our complete service offerings and make some hard decisions on what services will need to be reduced or even eliminated. At the end of the day we do have to protect the health and safety of our community, and that’s managing the waste stream.

And so at a minimum, we do have to provide weekly garbage. We do have five closed landfills and an active landfill that are heavily regulated when it comes to just air quality and the water and the land itself. So there’s a lot of costs that are associated with just managing all of these closed landfills and our active landfill.

So we would have to work with mayor and council and our community to determine what services are critical and essential to continue.

BRODIE: And it sounds like those that maybe were not deemed that way, you might have to stop doing?

STOELLER: Yes, yes.

EDITOR'S NOTE: This story's headline has been updated to correct how much the trash pickup rates will increase.