Trash and recycling collection in Barrington could look different in the near future. 

The lone company to bid on the town’s trash and recycling collection contract is offering Barrington two options: Manpower or mechanical. 

Mega Disposal’s bid included the option to stay with the current program which employs workers to pick up the trash and recycling bins left curbside each week. It also offered a second option — the town could move to automated collection, where a truck equipped with a mechanical arm would complete the same task. 

“It’s just a choice,” said Barrington Town Manager Phil Hervey. “It is a $190,000 difference between the two.”

Hervey said the manpower option would cost Barrington $1,689,212 next year. The automated option would cost $1,497,190. Hervey said the town had prepared for a 10 percent increase over the current contract, which would have been $1,568,600 — that means the automated option is well below the budgeted amount. 

The trash and recycling collection bid choice will go before the Barrington Town Council at its next meeting, set for April 6.

Mega Disposal has provided refuse and recycling collection services to the town ever since Barrington moved from in-house (DPW collection) to a private vendor in 2010. Earlier this year, the town posted a request for proposals for collection services, but received only one bid — the two-option offer from Mega.

Hervey said the automated option offered some benefits in addition to a lower cost. 

“One of the things I pointed out is that I believe there will be less litter out there, because of the lids,” Hervey said. “The wind I see in my neighborhood, I’m picking stuff up out of the (grass) right by this access path to the water. People have good intentions. They want to recycle this stuff, but it blows right out. I’m picking it out of there all the time.”

With the mechanical option, Mega Disposal would provide two 95-gallon containers to each residential unit. One container would be for trash, while the other would be for recycling. Hervey said the containers would be free to residents. He added that the containers’ lids would help keep recycling items dry — the recycling plant will occasionally reject loads of recycling if they are too wet. 

The automated collection option would impact bulky items left curbside, said Hervey.

“The frequency of collection will remain as we do it now, but with automated collection, residents will not be able to put out bulky materials or other stuff outside the carts until bulky collection day,” Hervey said. “…Residents will have to call Mega directly to schedule the bulk item collection. It’s a little extra step there.”

The bulky items pick-up would be on two collection days per month — for example, the second and fourth Tuesdays every month, regardless of residents’ regular collection days. 

Yard waste collection will remain the same in either option, Hervey said. It will be collected as it is now, with a rear-collection truck. 

“…if we go this route, it will be a lot of education for people on what is recyclable. You don’t have eyes on it as much, because it’s automated,” Hervey said. 

The manpower approach allows workers to see what residents have placed in their recycling bins before tossing them into the trucks. That will not be the case with the automated option.

Contract details

Barrington Department of Public Works Director Alan Corvi said a total of three vendors attended the pre-bid meeting with the town, but only Mega submitted a bid. 

The contract would be a 12-month agreement starting July 1, 2026 and expiring June 30, 2027, with an annual renewal option for a maximum of five additional years. The contract also includes a town option of two additional years. 

Corvi said the contract would increase by CPI (cost of living price index) every year after the first year. Also, the contract would include language for a possible negotiated fuel surcharge if the United States is involved in a war or other such events “which affects the price and/or allocation of fuel or has an adverse economic impact on either or both parties.”

“This is pretty standard language for most multi-year service contracts,” Corvi said.