Local business will help Valpo audit trash services
By James D. Wolf jr. Post-Tribune correspondent October 13, 2012 5:34PM
Updated: November 15, 2012 6:37AM
VALPARAISO — Less than a month after the City Council voted to raise trash collection fees, the city is looking for ways to lower its collections costs.
The Valparaiso Department of Public Works is entering into an agreement with Valparaiso-based consulting firm Waste Revelation LLC. Under the agreement, Waste Revelation will look at the city’s agreements with the transfer site and any other vendors, review the city’s trash service for inefficiencies and negotiate any cost savings it can, Public Works Director Matt Evans said at the Board of Works and Safety meeting last week.
“It’s my desire to be as excellent in our services as possible,” Evans said. “This is just another piece to making sure the department runs efficiently.”
Waste Revelation will get paid a percentage of the savings it finds, and any savings will allow the Public Works Department to tighten budgets and free up money, Evans said.
When Evans asked the council to raise trash fees in September, he noted that trash and recycling collection costs about $15 per household. Fees increased in October from $9 to $12 for residents and $12 to $15 for businesses, and the increase will go toward road repairs around the city.
Doing this type of audit for a municipality is a new direction for Waste Revelation, said the firm’s president Cole Doolittle. However, the company has been doing these reviews for manufacturers and other businesses in the United States and Canada since he created it in South Carolina in 2000.
Usually the company only consults for municipalities.
The people at Waste Revelation have run transfer stations and waste and recycling companies before and know the costs, he said. Because of that, they can optimize and negotiate, and rely on getting paid a percentage of savings they find.
“We tie ourselves to our clients’ success,” Doolittle said.
Counting on businesses that try to sell services or items to give the best prices is like asking a car salesman what kind of car you should get and how much you can pay, he said.
Waste Revelation is also expanding what services it reviews and is looking at utilities, too.
Doolittle moved the business, now at Washington and Jefferson streets, to his native Valparaiso in 2004.
Valparaiso is centrally located to places the business serves and close to airports, and Indiana has a good climate for businesses, he said.
He also likes the downtown as a place to walk when taking a break.
“There are a lot of conveniences to this area,” Doolittle said.
