BATON ROUGE - Since September 2023, East Baton Rouge Parish has been voluntarily collecting large woody waste piles. That's coming to an end. There was money available to fund the effort, but that money is running out. Now the new administration is looking to see if they can make changes to what it inherited. 

After its contract with Republic Services expired, the City-Parish signed a new deal with Richard's Disposal to handle its yard and bulk waste pickup. The new contract excluded some things that many residents had grown accustomed to.

William Daniel is the Assistant Chief Administrative Officer for the Department of Public Works. Daniel says DPW cannot continue to pick up woody waste piles voluntarily.

"We no longer pick up quite a few of the things we used to pick up and there seems to be some miscommunication among the public on what that is today," said Daniel.

Mayor-President Sid Edwards is currently looking at ways to restore that service, but the parish is locked into a contract with Richard's Disposal until 2030. That contract does not include unlimited out-of-cart service, which many people are used to. Richard's Disposal will pick up small bundles of woody waste, which includes things that one person can pick up and put their arms around. Anything longer than five feet and wider than six inches in diameter will be left behind. 

The calls to 311 for missed debris collection are steadily coming in. 

"What they don't understand is the previous administration changed the contract," said Daniel.

The parish is currently operating a couple of trucks with booms that run throughout the whole parish. That service will continue until the end of the year but after then will be discontinued. Richard's Disposal does not operate boom trucks.

"We are doing everything we can to facilitate that but we can only do it for a limited amount of time," said Daniel.

Richard's Disposal will come to your property to pick up large piles of debris for a price. 

More information about the parish's solid waste collection can be found here.