At a budget meeting on Tuesday, May 19, Mayor Sami Barile and councilmembers Frank McGuffin and William Rooney expressed support for elimination of ALL commercial garbage collection within the city limits. Such a move would have saved the city some money but would have required many businesses (apartment owners, Morristown Housing Authority, trailer parks, etc.) to contract with a commercial garbage service to handle their garbage and waste disposal.
Of course, if businesses had to contract for private sanitation service, one of the largest beneficiaries of such a move would be Tidi-Waste, a commercial garbage service owned by councilman Frank McGuffin's family. [At the meeting, McGuffin acknowledged that several businesses have already cancelled commercial contracts and have apparently requested multiple city garbage cans instead.]
While there was no support for eliminating all commercial garbage collection from the other four councilmembers, City Administrator Jim Crumley instituted a moratorium on future business requests for garbage cans, stating that he (Crumley) would not honor any future request by a business for multiple cans.
On Thursday, May 21, the council met again to discuss the budget. Councilman Frank McGuffin asked about Crumley's moratorium and questioned the legality of this action. Crumley stated that refusing to honor new requests for multiple cans would be legal since it would just be a new city "policy." McGuffin said it might be viewed as discriminatory and that the city attorney should look at this.
[McGuffin is related to City Attorney Dick Jessee so Frank may have some inside legal info on this issue. Frank is either truly concerned about the discriminatory nature of the new Crumley/City policy, or Frank may be thinking that if the Crumley/City policy is determined to be illegal, then councilmembers might go back and again consider ending ALL commercial pick-up, which, of course, would benefit Tidi-Waste.]
Ignoring Frank's motives, it would seem that one commercial business should not be treated differently from another similarly situated commercial business in regard to provision of city services. Any city policy should treat all businesses fairly and equitably and should not unfairly discriminate between businesses.
City revenues are used to provide sanitation services (cans and curbside pick-up). There are policies for different groups (residential, commercial, etc.), but these policies should be fair and equitable for each group. You can't have a policy for residences that says that the city will pick-up garbage at residences except for those that have a brick veneer. Wonder if Crumley also thinks that you could have a new "policy" that refuses to give garbage cans to new residences?
As Frank mentioned, Crumley's refusal to give city garbage cans to a business that requests them after May 21, 2009, could be seen as discriminatory. What Crumley is instituting is a policy that discriminates against one business and favors another similarly situated business.
Crumley seems to think that if it's a "city policy," it's automatically good to go. End of discussion. Frank seems to think, and I would agree, that the city policy has to be legal and non-discriminatory.
Another way to look at this would be to imagine that there are two companies in the same type of business located side-by-side on Main Street. They both pay property taxes, personal property taxes, business taxes, permits and licensing fees, and on and on.
Business Owner #1 has used city garbage cans for 5 years. Business Owner #2 has used a dumpster for 5 years but has now decided to use city garbage cans just like his neighbor business. Business Owner #2 calls up Jim Crumley and asks for the same number of garbage cans that Business Owner #1 has. Crumley says "no" and adds that there is a new city policy (as of May 19) that multiple garbage cans will no longer be provided to businesses that request them.
How can you tell one commercial/business/taxpayer that his taxes include a garbage can and garbage pick-up and then tell another commercial/ business/taxpayer right next door that HIS taxes do NOT include a garbage can and garbage pick-up?
No doubt the city attorney will be called on to look at this new Crumley policy. There are really two questions here. One is legal. One has to do with good policy.
If the city attorney determines that Crumley's policy is not legal, that will probably be the end of it.
But, if the city attorney somehow finds that this particular discrimination is technically "legal," then the councilmembers would still need to ask themselves whether they really want to establish or allow the City Administrator to establish a policy that treats one city business owner/taxpayer differently from another city business owner/taxpayer?
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