Contract Services

Central Contra Costa Solid Waste Authority

Sole Source Negotiations

2003 - 2004

Client Needs

The franchise agreements between the Central Contra Costa Solid Waste Authority and their current service providers were set to expire in March 2006.  The customers within the Authority’s service area had been receiving excellent service at reasonable rates; therefore, the Authority was interested in conducting sole-source negotiations with the current haulers instead of competitively soliciting proposals.  The Authority was also interested in increasing diversion.  Because this was not being done in a competitive environment, the Authority needed to be assured that the new and existing services would be provided at a reasonable cost.

HF&H Solutions

With the assistance of the Authority and another solid waste consultant (Brown Vence & Associates) HF&H managed the sole-source negotiations.  This process included meeting with Authority staff to discuss its goals and objectives; reviewing the existing agreements; preparing recommendations for modifications to the existing agreements; soliciting cost proposals; evaluating the cost proposals for reasonableness with industry standards; and, negotiating the final terms of the new franchise agreements.

To increase diversion, HF&H researched and documented various approaches jurisdictions have used to provide incentives to haulers to maximize diversion.  To assure the proposed costs were competitive; HF&H compared the costs and operations assumptions to industry benchmarks that we have gathered from rate reviews and procurements for similar services.

Results

The final negotiated revenue requirement was 1.7% less than the revenues from current rates.  The final franchise agreements included diversion and service enhancements including:

• A residential food waste collection pilot program;
• Single-stream residential recyclable materials collection instead of dual sort; and,
• Free recyclable materials collection at member agency facilities and special events and for small businesses.