UPDATE: Waste Connections has provided us with the following response:
"Waste Connections was completely shocked when we found out that we would not be continuing service to St. Landry Parish. We have provided a safe and reliable service to over 36,000 households and businesses over the past 15 years, utilizing the best and safest equipment in the industry, all while having minimum complaints. When we asked Mr. LeBouef the reasons for switching contractors, he stated to us that he was going with a local company, however all of Waste Connections employees live in the parish and we purchase all our supplies locally as well. Mr. LeBouef stated that Waste Connections did not provide video feed, however on several occasions Waste Connections provided these items upon request. Mr. LeBouef stated that the parish deserves better, however the new vendor has 0 years of experience in the industry. Although we are disappointed in the decision the parish has made, we would like to thank the residents of St Landry Parish for their continued support and opportunity to serve them as their waste provider."
Here's the original story:
St. Landry Parish is transitioning to a new waste service company, which has some residents questioning the new service schedule.
“As far as I've seen this morning the trash passed today and they dumbed the trash with the old company and they picked up their trash cans. And we're here left with the new one so we'll see where that goes," resident Kevin Jones said.
Bayou State Waste will now be St. Landry Parish's new waste service company, operating Monday through Friday based on location.
"To have purchased a trash can from waste connections or bought one from Lowes. We will service it, we still have a service anything policy. Our contracts states, the unlimited amount of waste, at the road residential, we have to collect."
Some residents in the area are not happy their waste will only be picked up once a week as opposed to twice a week.
“The changes are going again to be able to facilitate a better, more thorough pick up. We felt the need to go to once a week but this is what you got to figure. The people in the rural areas have always had once a week pick up," St. Landry Parish Solid wasted district Executive Director, Richard Lebouef said.
Services with Bayou State Waste will have the ability to be monitored by Lebouef and waste services to assure quality services.
"Someone calls and says, hey, they skipped our trashcan. I can say simply, okay, what's your address? I can look it up in the system. And you know, show me a video of what happened. And I can say oh, yeah, well, you can wasn't there or there was a car blocking it or yep, you can was there we did miss it. We'll send a truck back. We got it taken. Care of. You know that kind of thing," Chief Operations Officer Kevin Lavergne said.
Lebouef also says their entity often had issues with the integrity of waste connections as their contracts ends.
"Yeah, which connection refused on for about the last two and a half years to give us any access to any video or any kind of GPS. So the contract stated that we had, if there was, an excess of $1,000 fine. In a quarter we had to have an arbitrary joint meeting to be on a short paid invoice. The people in this parish deserve a lot better"
"We're adding another litter abatement team which is to control some of the litter and we're also adding two. We've also added two bulky white good vegetation waste recovery vehicles. Whereas waste connections only had one," Lebouef added
Here’s how residents could assist in bayou state waste on their pick-up routes.
"Keep cans close together or vehicle right by our mailbox right by the karate kid. The older style is leaving. Could grab we won't be able to because our claws are a little bit bigger. So the best thing they could do is just spaced the cans out a little bit more than what they used to and that would make a world difference," Jake said.
We reached out to waste connections for comment and are waiting on a response.
Bayou State Waste will begin services on October 1st.
For more information on Bayou State Waste click here.
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