SIOUX CENTER—The Sioux Center City Council approved a new five-year contract with Brommer Sanitation for solid waste and recycling collection. This also comes with a rate increase.
The city’s current contract that has been in place for five years will expire June 30.
Effective July 1, there will be a base fee of $16.50 for a 65-gallon container and $19.85 base fee for a 95-gallon container per residential customer.
That is an 80-cent increase for both containers as currently residential customers pay $15.70 for a 65-gallon container and $18.90 for a 95-gallon container.
Brommer’s owner Les Brommer of Sioux Center said the initial 80-cent increase includes 50 cents for the $5 increase the landfill is adding for tonnage starting July 1.
The new contract also keeps the present fuel surcharge in effect and continues the automatic pass-through of landfill tonnage increases of 10 cents for each $1 the landfill charges go up.
The city currently charges $17.85 (plus a 18-cent fuel surcharge) to residential customers for our 65-gallon container. The difference between Brommer’s fees and the city’s fees goes toward city costs such as billing, container purchases, tree disposal site and administration. Staff recommended continuing the $2.15 difference.
The renewed contract also includes a 35-cent annual increase for each of the last four years of the contract.
The service from Brommer includes weekly residential garbage pickup and residential recycling pickup two times per month.
Brommer said the company is also in the process of remodeling and upgrading its can redemption center. The sorting equipment has arrived but needs to be installed. Limits on number of cans and plastic will be lifted once the center is open.
Dave Brommer said the company also offers secure paper shredding services, which processed about 80 ton in 2023 — about 80 percent of which was in Sioux Center alone.
“Every ton of paper recycled saves 17 trees and 500 gallons of fuel,” he said.
“We’re so much more than a garbage company; that’s the way my dad taught me,” Les Brommer said, noting his son Dave is the fourth generation leading the 100-year-old company.