Photograph: Discarded garbage is deposited alongside a Bayou State dumpster Monday at the intersection of Arlis Lane and La. 182 north of Opelousas. (Photograph by Freddie Herpin.)
BOBBY ARDOIN
Editor/Consulting Writer
After a problematic initial week of collecting residential and commercial garbage throughout St. Landry Parish, Bayou State Waste Collection appears at this point to be operating more efficiently, according to Solid Waste Commission executive director Richard LeBouef.
LeBouef told a monthly Solid Waste Commission meeting Monday afternoon that Bayou State experienced what he described as a “really rough first week” as the company attempted to collect garbage in all areas of St. Landry.
“(Trucks) were back on the road at 8:35 (Monday morning) and things are going smoothly,” LeBouef said during a portion of his executive director’s report.
Bayou State Waste, which received a five-year contract from the Commission and assumed parish wide garbage collection Oct. 1, did its best to compensate for the issues the company experienced during the first week, LeBouef said.
“They were re-running a lot of the routes and spent most of the week catching up. I am going to speak with the Eunice City Council (on Tuesday night). Today (Monday) I spoke with (Opelousas) Mayor Alsandor. I am asking everyone to have patience with this transition,” LeBouef told the Commission.
Bayou State garbage trucks were heading into the solid waste landfill as late as 5:30 p.m. on Monday.
LeBouef said apparently some of the truck drivers were perhaps bothered by unfamiliarity with their routes in the Opelousas area in addition to households which appeared unfamiliar with the change in revised garbage collection days.
One of the features of the new collection process with Bayou State Waste, is the company is picking up garbage once a week now inside the incorporated areas of the parish, LeBouef has said over the past year during several public hearings on the matter.
Also the company has acquired two collection trucks that will be added to the fleet, while ordering two more trucks that will be prepared to augment the process of facilitating more than 36,000 St. Landry households, LeBouef said.
In separate statements issued on the Commission website and Lafayette television stations last week, LeBouef did his best to mollify the issues Bayou State had with customer complaints.
During one television station interview, LeBouef said Bayou State was running one to two days behind schedule last week.
“We ask for your indulgence as we make this transition. Phones at Bayou State are overloaded and they are diligently trying to rectify all the issues. We at St. Landry Solid Waste are doing our best to remedy all the complaints and assist (Bayou State) with the transition,” LeBouef said in a statement.
In another statement from LeBouef on Oct. 8, he offered apologies for the delays in service.
“I want all of you to know that we share your concerns and we are most certainly trying to get the routes, the collection services and distributions of all the (collection) carts to all of our residents collected and established,” LeBouef said in the statement.
Bayou State assumed control of the parish collections from Waste Connections, which operated parish garbage service in St. Landry under various company names for the last 15 years.
In a Sept. 27 statement issued by Waste Connections and published on a Lafayette television website, the company said that it considered its services in St. Landry to have been “safe and reliable.”
The company statement also said that the Commission decided this past year to hire Bayou State, a company located in St. Landry to perform the garbage collections.
Waste Connections in its statement, also said Bayou State is a company that has no experience in providing collection services.
