Member Spotlight: Allied Waste Services
Allied Waste Services takes 550 tons of waste to its landfill in LaGrange, MO every day. However, a new recycling program may reduce that figure significantly. Recently, Allied Waste began offering single-stream recycling for businesses.
“If your business currently has a large container for trash and a small or no container for recyclables, we’d like to help you reverse those containers,” says Bill Romans, division manager. “This new program eliminates the need to sort materials. Office paper, junk mail, telephone books, catalogs, cardboard, soda cans, plastics, and more can all be put together in the same container for recycling. We want to help companies recycle more items than they throw away.
“It’s not only good for the environment, it will also save the company money by reducing the size or number of pick-ups needed on their waste container,” he continues, noting that Allied already recycles around 100 tons of cardboard per month.
Allied Waste Services is a subsidiary of Republic Services, the second largest waste services company in the United States with 348 hauling companies and 193 landfills serving customers in 40 states and Puerto Rico. The Quincy facility has its roots in the former Quincy Saniway company, which was purchased by BFI in 1972. Allied Waste merged with BFI in 1999 and with Republic Services in 2009. The royal blue, red and white colors have remained the same, but customers will be noticing the Republic Services logo on new trucks in the near future.
Allied’s 16 route trucks serve customers in a 75-mile radius of Quincy. In addition to businesses, Allied Waste serves residential customers and several municipalities. Currently 60 percent of those residential customers have been switched to automated collection. This type of collection eliminates the need for the driver to exit the cab approximately 50 percent of the time by using an arm with a grabber on each container, which is then lifted over the truck and turned upside down for collection.
“There’s nothing more important than safety for our employees,” says Romans. “Automation keeps our employees in the trucks, protecting them from oncoming traffic, and also reduces back injuries from lifting heavy objects. Some of our route drivers throw 12 tons of trash each day. We try to reduce that stress every chance we get.”
To reinforce the emphasis on safety, all employees attend weekly safety meetings and receive regular training in proper lifting and sitting techniques along with different types of defensive driving skills. Romans boasts that, currently, the Quincy Division has gone more than three years without an employee being injured on the job and the majority of drivers have gone more than 10 years without an accident.
Romans is also proud of the company’s community involvement.
“We’re very community minded, and we encourage and reward our employees for volunteer work,” he says, noting that employee’s staff recycling events, help with Eagle Scout projects, volunteer at many different events and serve on committees and boards of directors for non-profit organizations, including the Chamber of Commerce. “We’re a national company, but we have a local emphasis and look for ways to give back to the community we serve.”
For more information about waste services for your business or home, call 217-223-4100, stop by their offices at 3110 Kochs Lane during normal business hours, or visit www.alliedwastequincy.com.
