A Jacksonville Solid Waste Division worker collects recyclables in 2022. | Dennis Ho for Jacksonville Today
Published on February 11, 2025 at 10:34 pm
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The annual fee that Jacksonville residents pay for trash collection is going up, after a 12-to-7 vote by the City Council Tuesday night. Mayor Donna Deegan has already said she supports the measure and plans to sign it into law.
The fee, which residents pay as part of their property tax bills, will go up from the current $151 to $324 this year, and eventually to $384 in 2027, with gradual steps up over the next two years.
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The seven Council members who voted no on the proposal were Ron Salem, Rory Diamond, Terrance Freeman, Nick Howland, Reggie Gaffney, Jr., Mike Gay and Kevin Carrico.
“I keep going back to what my constituents tell me, and looking at the whole big picture here…there’s a lotta holes to fix before we go sticking our hand into the pocket of our citizens,” Gay said. “The last resort we should do is to go increase a fee or tax, or whatever you call it, but I won’t be supporting it.”
Yes votes came from council President Randy White, Ken Amaro, Raul Arias, Michael Boylan, Joe Carlucci, Matt Carlucci, Tyrona Clark-Murray, Ju’Coby Pittman, Rahman Johnson, Will Lahnen, Chris Miller and Jimmy Peluso.
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Clark-Murray, a co-sponsor of the proposal, said, “We’ve got to do this. Our jobs are to solve a problem. This is a problem that’s been looming for decades. And we have the ability with the simple press of a button to solve the problem.”
Jacksonville residents’ garbage fees have not risen in 15 years and do not cover the service cost — which has been forcing the city to use general funds. That’s not a sustainable solution, though, because the money must be paid back, and the “debt” the city owes itself to cover the gap is projected to reach half-a-billion dollars by 2031.
Council member Matt Carlucci, who brought the proposal forward initially, also argued that residents of the Beaches and Baldwin were unfairly subsidizing Jacksonville’s trash collection because they pay for their own collection services but also see their tax dollars used to bridge the gap for Jacksonville’s.
In an email to Jacksonville Today on Tuesday, Carlucci said he’d pitched the fee hike to citizens at eight town hall meetings and at businesses.
“To my surprise I received very little pushback… I was astounded, but I was also proud that people cared enough about their community to come out and listen to the complexities of things (and) want to fix it,” he said.
In order to avoid overburdening the lowest-income residents, the council on Tuesday also voted to cap the garbage fee at the current $151 for households that make up to 150% of the federal poverty level. For a family of four, that is $48,225.
