The city of East Lansing wants to change the way the city takes out the trash.
But the issue of whether to add an automated waste collection system will have to wait three weeks for the next council meeting before a decision can be made.
The East Lansing City Council voted unanimously to defer a vote on an ordinance to add the system to its current garbage collection system.
Councilmember Bill Sharp said he had concerns because of comments received during the public hearing on the issue held Tuesday night, as well as letters he had received from constituents.
“We’re not trying to say this is a perfect system, but it is a better solution,” City Manager Ted Staton said during the meeting.
The automated collection system would be mandatory for rental properties that house more than two families per unit and optional for residential home owners. Participants would pay a one-time fee for their new garbage can. The cans would come in three sizes: 32 gallons at $35, 64 gallons at $40 and a 96 gallon can at $45.
A service fee of $50 a year would be charged to users of the 96 gallon container.
Resident Danetta Brant took part in the trial study on automated garbage collection in 1997.
“In the pilot program we were using the 64-gallon containers and in our charming quaint houses in the Bailey Neighborhood we have tiny one-car garages, and there wasn’t enough room for the tote and the car,” she said at the hearing.
If the city is able to go to an automated collection system they will purchase two new vehicles at about $190,000 a truck, a $20,000 per truck increase over the manual collection trucks said Peter Eberz of the Public Works and Environmental Services division. But the new trucks would be purchased by trading in the older vehicles.
“Going to the automated system with a reasonable participation rate would also allow us to drop from three trucks to two,” he said. “And as we get more and more participation there will be less lifting and less risk of injury to our workers.”
If the ordinance passes the council in its next meeting Eberz said the new program could be under way as soon as November for residential home owners and the mandatory program for rental properties would begin next August.
