New Orleans Mayor LaToya Cantrell's office today announced the city has reached a negotiated settlement with Metro Service Group, which for years had been one of the city's residential garbage and trash contractors.
The agreement, negotiated by federal bankruptcy judge David R. Jones, allows the city of New Orleans to proceed with new waste collection contracts that took effect last month. In exchange, the city agrees to pay $3.9 million to the Metro estate, and Metro Service Group will make an asset purchase payment of $2.2 million.
Metro handled trash collection in New Orleans East, Gentilly, and Lakeview -- generally in areas north of I-10. But the company began having trouble in recent years meeting its obligations to the contract.
Metro blamed the pandemic and related worker shortage for its inability to put enough crews on garbage trucks to continue twice-weekly service. The mayor's office agreed to let them scale back to once-a-week collection.
Then Hurricane Ida hit in August 2021. The increase in trash and debris from people cleaning up and cleaning out overwhelmed trash collection, and other trash hauling companies were brought in to pick up the slack.
Metro filed for bankruptcy protection earlier this year, and said that meant the city could not terminate its contract with Metro. The city responded by ordering Metro to honor the contract as written, meaning they had to resume twice-weekly pickup throughout the service area.
