Fruit Heights may get waste program

FRUIT HEIGHTS — Fruit Heights residents are a step closer to having Davis County's first curbside green-waste program.

The Fruit Heights City Council first wants to know how many residents would participate in the program, which would cost each household $6 a month to have an extra can to be used strictly for grass clippings, yard waste, bushes or tree limbs.

The green waste would be hauled to the Layton landfill, where it would be composted and sold to the public.

The council recently voted to include a postage-paid postcard with residents' May utility bills. Residents who don't want to participate in the green-waste program must check a box on the card and return it to the city so a special green-waste can won't show up at their homes in July.

Residents who don't return the cards will be assumed to want the can.

Without enough participation in the city — about 800 of the 1,395 homes that have garbage cans — the program wouldn't be cost-effective for Robinson Waste to haul the green waste.

Currently, residents in Fruit Heights pay $14.30 a month for their first garbage can and $8.30 a month for a second can.

With 55 percent, Fruit Heights has the highest percentage of second-can customers in the Wasatch Integrated Waste Management District, a special service district that runs the Layton landfill and accompanying incinerator.

Wasatch Integrated executive director Nathan Rich said he wanted to work with Fruit Heights on a pilot program because of the high number of second cans. Rich's theory is that customers with a second can use that can for yard waste during the spring, summer and fall.

That would mean a $2.30-a-month reduction for residents who replace a second garbage can with a green-waste can.

If the pilot program is successful, it could be implemented in other cities in the district.

Before the council's vote, it held a public hearing, during which one comment was made.

Resident Jerry Cranford told the council he would not participate in the pilot program.

"I'm going to opt out," he said. "It's a $6 tax on everybody in Fruit Heights."

Cranford also predicts the cost will increase from $6 in the next few years.

City officials estimate it will cost about $750 to produce the postcards.

E-MAIL: jdougherty@desnews.com