Hi, I have been on the municipal side of the Solid Waste industry for 17 years. I have worn many hats during this time, with the last 3.5 years being in management. There are so many challenges that we encompass each day, as many others do, I'm sure. Because the industry seems to have such a huge turnaround with drivers/helpers due to the pay and/or nature of the job, I feel it hard to build a good reliable team. We collect solid waste 5 days a week, between trash, recycle yard waste and bulk for just over 4K residents. We seem to have quite a bit of missed collections each day, drivers who call out often, drivers who just want to drive and go home and don't tend to look further than the steering wheel but want to complain about the contamination or cart issues.
I'm sure this is most likely across the board but I would love to hear from others and how you deal with these situations and possibly incentive programs or other measures besides continual reprimand.
I look forward to hearing back from you! Thanks
Christie Murphy
City of Milford, Delaware
Solid Waste and Facilities Supervisor