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From:James Cowing <br />To:GRP-City Council <br />Cc:James (Jim) Cowing; Manette Cowing <br />Subject:Proposed Rate Increase Written Protest <br />Date:Thursday, January 23, 2025 2:18:46 PM <br />[You don't often get email from james.a.cowing@gmail.com. Learn why this is important at <br />https://aka.ms/LearnAboutSenderIdentification ] <br />Dear Redwood City Council <br />My spouse and I are long-time (35 years) residents of Redwood City. <br />I am writing to protest the proposed monthly solid waste rate increase to be discussed on January 27 by Council. <br />We understand that rates may need to be increased to address rising costs mentioned including labor, fuel/power, <br />operating and disposal/processing. However, we ADAMANTLY protest RC’s choice to UNFAIRLY penalize those <br />customers like ourselves who already use the smallest collection bins, and give inequitable rate increases to those <br />with larger bins. Reviewing the current and proposed rates, the increase represents over 25% increase for 20-gallon <br />carts, 15.3% for 32-gallon, 8.1% for 64-gallon and 4.9% for 96-gallon. The reason for this inequity in price increase <br />defies logic. Redwood City should be incentivizing people who put out more solid waste to reduce their overall <br />waste, not penalizing those who already minimize waste or have smaller family size. I have reviewed the increases <br />for neighboring cities such as San Mateo which is also proposing to increase monthly rates, but even their increases <br />are percentage-wise higher for larger can sizes (21% for 32 gallon, 13.3% for 64 gallon and 9.5% for the 96 gallon <br />collection carts). <br />Households like ours that are minimizing solid waste to only 20% are unfairly being burdened with carrying the cost <br />of increases for all. What business can possibly justify increasing their annual cost 25%, especially in these <br />inflationary times with all our other costs rising. <br />Please re-consider your allocation of cart cost proposed changes to make increases more equitable and fair to all <br />customers. At the same time, please spend more time to understand how and why collection costs could be rising so <br />much. RC should invest more attention to reducing its rising costs. <br />Thank you for your consideration. <br />signature: JAMES A COWING <br />James and Manette Cowing <br />840 Corriente Point Drive <br />Redwood Shores, Ca 94065 <br />Sent from my iPhone