The Bainbridge Island City Council held a vote at its April 8 meeting to continue negotiations with local waste business Bainbridge Disposal and to pause any notice to the state Utility and Transportation Commission regarding solid waste services.

Currently, there is no predetermined date for which an agreement must be reached with BD, city communications coordinator Shannon Hays wrote in an email.

Diane Landry, a waste reduction consultant for the city, expressed her desire to continue to support the local business. “I think it’s very valuable to keep a local business owner in charge,” she said.

BD owner Heather Church expressed her concerns about the city’s proposal to move forward to notify the UTC.

“What’s being proposed would give up a long-standing, successful partnership built on trust and hard work in exchange for an agreement that could eventually be canceled at any time,” Church said. “The change would open the door for large out of state corporations like waste management to take over locally run service that has always been community focused and willing to work with the city.”

City manager Blair King said he would like to continue the city’s relationship with BD as the company has been beneficial to the community. King said the notification option to UTC is a “backup” plan. He also said the cost of managing backyard compostables, education and continuing enforcement representation may require a full-time staff member to handle those responsibilities.

Councilmember Kirsten Hytopoulos said the city has not decided to bring in outside firms such as Waste Management to provide services to BI. The council is also trying to balance both municipal climate goals and state requirements regarding solid waste, she said.

“To clarify that everything we’ve done so far to date has been with the intention of maintaining Bainbridge Disposal as our provider,” Hytopoulos said. “It’s about creating the appropriate contractual relationship that any city would have with its waste provider, and it is about us implementing our solid waste policy.”

Councilmember Jon Quitslund said he doesn’t anticipate the city taking over solid waste operations. “I would like to see some way of engaging, an agreement between this important, long-standing private local business and the city that does not involve anything that looks like a takeover by the city. That’s never been in my understanding, that’s never been the desire,” he said.

Mayor Ashley Mathews said public input surrounding the proposal has been one of the highest engagements she has seen in recent years. Councilmember Joe Deets described the benefits of the partnership between the city and BD, including increases in both recycling and composting, greater outreach in harder-to-reach service areas and improved opportunities addressing organic waste disposal.

“These are the things I want to see us address in our discussions with Bainbridge Disposal,” he said.

Councilmember Clarence Moriwaki said he wanted to reassure members of the public expressing concerns about secrecy of council meetings without the public during executive sessions and discussing ongoing contract negotiations with a service provider.

“We do this because we want stewards of our tax dollars, and we want to be properly following procedures and laws of which we’re required to follow,” Moriwaki said. “I really want to stress that it’s a myth. It was not an effort to keep anybody in the dark.”