The Wrangell sentinel., 1952-02-22
F0RTY-F0UR
 ATTEND COUNCIL MEETING TUESDAY

For two and one-half hours last Tuesday evening. II townspeople and the city council discussed the
 councils arrangement for garbage collection here.
 The meeting started with the l townspeople questioning the a. mount of rate increase and the me
 thod of hiring Richard Stokes, but ended with their wondering wheth- ! CT Stokes was getting enough mon ey for his job. To this end, they suggested the council put a clause in Stokes contract allowing for ] wage revision in the event the a. mount of garbage or rate for col-
 lection changes, and exempt him from snow removal at the dump. The city fathers unanimously voted the changes in the contract which will be typed up for signing at the next regular meeting, Tues. Mar. f. After the reading of the minutes Lennie Engstrom, former council imam, questioned whether the city could morally or legally enter into the contract without calling for bids. City Clerk Bob Wickman read a letter from City Attorney Howard Stabler explaining there was no law requiring the city to ask for bids on anything.
 Mayor Smith pointed out that to the citys request for bids in past years. only verbal agreements had ever been reached for handling the garbage.
 Councilman J. o. Bangeman af- garbage situation. added that un- der the previous arrangement com plaints on the garbage were only passed on to the Wrangell Transfer but that now the city would be re- sponsible for them and Stokes re- sponsible to the city. He said l Stokes was the only one interested in the job and would get the loan l for a new truck only if assured of the job and would operate for as l little as $25 a month over his es- timated expenses. The council a. greed with EngstrOm's stating that they were in no position to ask for bids after assuring the job.
 Letters were read from Sitka, Ketchikan and Petersburg explain l ing their garbage rates. Ketchikan l is $1.70 per can per month but the customer must move the can to the curb. sitka is $1.75 and Pet ersburg is $1OO for one can with 50 cents for each extra but is planning to raise to $1.50 or $2.00.
 The Mayor pointed out the new Wrangell fee of $2O0 was arrived I at after Stokes kept list of how much he collected at each place and how many he collected from. 1 He added that to justify the higher rate that previously all receipts had been turned over directly to the Wrangell Transfer with the city doing the billing and collecting at no charge, and it was determined that the city was entitled to some l thing for this work. Also, better than other towns, it is not neces- sary to set cans on the curb here and Stokes will pick up little eX- tra trash, besides the one can.
 Jim Myers asked if Wrangell Transfer had been granted any in- crease in the time it had the sery- ice. Mayor Smith said William Taylor appeared with Art Clark in 1946 and at that time made an oral bid for the job of $1.00, fifty cents less than Ellis Davies bid in 1948 Taylor and Walter Butler appeared to bid on the garbage and Taylor was given the nod by the council because he promised to buy spec ial new truck for the service. Since then, it wah stated that Taylor i has never been back to a council meeting.
 Bonnie Carlstrom said that from his understanding of Taylor's and Clarks letters printed in last weeks Sentinel, Taylor had been toI all the meetings. Becauhe they had not may have caused much of the misunderstanding.
 Stokes, at this point, appeared ready to dump the whole thing and said he hadn't signed the contract yet; that they could go by any rate they wanted; that he was tired of it (referring to the discussion). Ev- eryone assured Stokes nothing per sonal was meant as they continued the discussion.
 It then centered on how much was collected from the garbage and how only a 100 per cent raise could be expected to bring in over 100 per cent more revenue. CTaylor had previously reported making on ly about $314 per month and the city expected STOOD The clerk and council said some people hadn't been paying garbage and would be forced to do so by enforcing the l city ordinances one compelling