Ila Owers set a mattress on her curb for bulky pick-up just in time for the service to arrive on the first Monday in December. It sat there until January 5. A few weeks ago, bags of dog poop and kitty litter — that had originally been in her trash can — were left in her yard after the can was emptied.
So does Owers think that just because she and other residents will see a $5 trash fee added to their August water bills, Houston’s solid waste service will magically improve? She does not.
In fact, nobody truly believed — or was told — that the $24 million anticipated to come in over the next year from the new surcharge would be enough to immediately overhaul a department that has struggled for decades to pick up regular trash, heavy garbage and recycling when it says it’s going to.
Until the budget was adopted on June 10, Houston was the only major city in Texas that didn’t charge residents a trash fee. Mayor John Whitmire refers to the charge as an “administrative fee,” and some residents said at the time they didn’t care what it was called or even how much it was — within reason — as long as they could count on consistent, reliable pickup.
Four days after a request for comment was filed with Whitmire’s office last week, spokesman Alvaro Ortiz sent an email saying trash pickup collection times have “improved significantly” since the monthly fee was implemented; complaints about trash pickup operations “have gone down significantly;” and Houston Public Works is “in the process of scoping and determining equipment needs.”
Whitmire said in May that state law mandates that cities can’t provide a utility without assessing a charge, so when he proposed to move Solid Waste under the water utility fund, he did so with the $5 administration fee, saying that “we’re not going to do what I would call a genuine garbage fee until we can improve services.”
How long that will take is anybody’s guess. The fee is expected to rise incrementally in future years and could spike to $25 a month by 2031, pending council approval.
Last week, the Houston Press talked to three council members — Joe Panzarella, Edward Pollard and Alejandra Salinas — who agreed the Solid Waste Department is underfunded and the city should be able to provide the most basic of services.
However, self-described progressives Panzarella and Salinas, both of whom took office earlier this year, appear hopeful that the recently adopted budget signifies a long-term investment in improved solid waste service.
Pollard, who cast the only vote against Whitmire’s budget, has for the past three years used district funds on a third-party service to pick up bulky trash for his constituents.
“We don’t wait on the city,” he says. “We pay contractors to be on a certain schedule, or when we need on-call service, we schedule that with the neighborhoods. It’s unfortunate that we have to do that because the city hasn’t been able to provide the service in a reliable way, but I think it’s the modern approach to constituent services.”
Owers concedes that over the past three months, garbage trucks have arrived on time in her neighborhood on Monday mornings, but sometimes they leave bags behind, and she doesn’t think the recent consistency has any direct link to the fee approved in June.
She’s right, says Salinas.
“There are no specific commitments from the administration of improved reliability, although we hope we are working in that direction,” Salinas says. “As the administration’s own studies reflected, the fee would need to be significantly increased before we’re going to realize some of the major improvements in quality and reliability of collection.”
The status quo is unacceptable, she added. “It is unacceptable that we have not been able to meet that standard, and myself and others are committed to doing everything we can to get there,” she says.
Long-Term Investment
Whitmire’s budget was controversial as soon as it was unveiled because critics had difficulty understanding how it would address a $180 million deficit just by moving money around rather than generating enough new revenue to address the problem. Pollard says “there is no plan to address these issues, financially and from a service standpoint.”
“All we hear from the mayor is, ‘Trust me.” After a while, your words only mean so much. The actions speak much louder,” Pollard says.
In addition to approving the trash fee in June, council members agreed to move the $134 million Solid Waste fund under the utility system, which is largely supplemented by tax revenue. Under the new structure, trash pickup is funded by water revenues that critics say should be going toward much needed drainage projects.
Pollard says that most people don’t care about the details of how the city’s organizational chart is structured; they just want their trash picked up on time. “The expectation that your trash is going to get improved based on paying five dollars is not reality,” he says.
Whitmire said during budget hearings that planned improvements include restructuring operations, optimizing existing routes and providing leadership training. Fleet and equipment upgrades and expanded recycling and composting services are among the department’s long-term goals.
Public Works Director Randy Macchi, who now oversees Solid Waste, did not respond to requests for comment from the Press last week but has said that Solid Waste could be a “revenue-generating machine” if the city gets all five of its transfer stations — where city trucks drop trash to be transported to the landfill — up and running.
Contractors with Republic Services give the city a cut of the revenue generated, but only three of the transfer stations are currently operational. If that system meets its full potential, there will be no need to raise the fee beyond $5 a month, Macchi said in May.
Macchi, an attorney, was appointed to his role in November 2024, at which time Houston amended its ordinance that previously required the Public Works director to be a registered professional engineer.
As Houston leaders try to address the problems, the complaints keep rolling in. Last year, more than 36,604 calls were made to Houston 311 about late trash pickup, representing the No. 1 complaint made to the non-emergency line.
Every large city in Texas has experienced periods of missed pickups, staffing shortages, equipment failures, or disputes over whether to use city employees or private contractors. Population growth has strained the systems that are already in place, and trash pickup can be slow during periods of severe weather when there are massive amounts of debris that overwhelm regular collection schedules. But a May 2026 analysis by the Houston Chronicle showed that Houston takes longer to resolve solid waste requests than other major cities.
Dallas charges $40.09 a month for trash pick-up, while San Antonio charges $35.75. Pearland and Sugar Land also have monthly trash fees, at $22.86 and $21.88, respectively. Austin charges a base fee of $23.80, plus $28.50 per month for a small 24-gallon trash can and up to $64.10 per month for an extra-large 96-gallon can.
Owers’ daughter TJ Owers, 20, said they discussed Houston’s “horrible trash service” with fellow Texans at the Texas Democratic Party convention in Corpus Christi in June.
“I met a guy from Austin who pays $50 a month and he said they never miss a pickup,” they said. “Don’t tell my mom, but I think if we knew they were going to pick it up on time, we’d be willing to pay that.”
Not every Houstonian uses city trash pickup. About 47,000 households — most of which are in affluent neighborhoods — use private trash service that is subsidized by the city or funded through an HOA to which they pay dues. In an informal survey last week, the Press couldn’t find a single person who has problems with private trash collection.
Jennifer Lorenz lives in Cypress and trash pickup is included in her water bill, which comes from the Municipal Utility District that services her neighborhood. The service comes twice a week on the designated mornings and Lorenz says she can’t recall a time in recent years when it’s been late.
Pollard’s District J, which he refers to as “J City,” has more struggles with heavy trash than weekly regular collection, which is why he’s funneled up to $200,000 out of his $1 million district fund each year to have a contractor pick up things like mattresses and furniture.
“This administration has not been able to make any progress on heavy trash pickup and has done a poor job in communicating to neighborhoods on what the expectations are and how they’re going to rectify it being late so often,” he says.
Panzarella reiterates that the problem centers on a lack of funding. While 75 percent of Houston’s general fund goes toward police and fire, other basic city services like parks, libraries and trash collection are neglected, he says.
The council member had about two weeks to prepare for the budget vote after he was sworn into office on May 27. He says he was hopeful at the time that Whitmire’s proposal to move Solid Waste into the water utility fund would improve efficiencies.
“I didn’t just vote yes [on the budget] because I wanted to go along to get along,” he says. “One of the number one complaints I heard on the campaign trail and the actual number one 311 request last year was solid waste. While I had many issues with using water funds to fill the budget gap, and continuing to have this overtime spending issue, the underlying value of this budget was improvement in solid waste, and I think that’s what a lot of folks are looking for.”
Illegal Dumping
Ila Owers has lived at her home at Shepherd and Interstate 10 since 2002. She’s a widow and her two children are grown, so she lives alone with pets, except when her daughter TJ is staying over.
When she got rid of an old mattress last December and her neighbors complained that it had been on the driveway for an entire month, she explained that she doesn’t have the ability to haul bulky items back and forth between her house and the curb just because it’s not aesthetically pleasing.
“My neighbors were calling me and bugging me, like, ‘Can’t you put that somewhere else? It’s so ugly.’ Well, it’s heavy. I put it out for heavy trash,” she says. “There’s one of me. I can’t lift it and put it in the garage. I called [the District C council member’s office], and they did not respond.”
The District C council member at that time was Abbie Kamin, who is now serving as interim Harris County attorney. Panzarella represents the district now and says that when constituents reach out to him about trash pickup, he can check to see what the problem is but the most efficient way to get a resolution is to call 311.
Houston native Cheryl Henderson, who lives in a one-bedroom studio apartment on Rosedale in Third Ward, says the problem with delayed trash collection has plagued Houston for decades.
“It causes maggots, and there’s flies everywhere,” she says. “It smells.”
Henderson was at City Hall a couple of weeks ago advocating for mandatory air conditioning in Houston apartments. “They’re always saying our voices matter, but they really need to listen to the people who voted them in,” she says. “They need to put the money where it’s supposed to be and not be buying police cruisers.”
On the last Monday in June, after the budget passed and it was at least implied, if not promised, that Solid Waste service would eventually improve, Ila Owers came home mid-morning to find that her garbage had been picked up but there were two plastic bags of trash — containing animal waste — on the street in front of her house.
“So they’d picked up the trash but they left half of it on the street,” she says. “I called and the city never responded. As far as I know, the case is still open with 311. It was dog poop and cat litter. It was so gross. It was all double-bagged, but the bag broke and it was so hot that day, it was disgusting. I picked it up. I took a shovel and put it back in the can.”
When trash isn’t picked up on time, it leads to hazardous debris in roadways, illegal dumping and general dissatisfaction with the city, Henderson says, noting that people throw their trash into bayous and ditches that flood. The water gets contaminated and backs up into people’s sinks and toilets.
The Houston Health Department has acknowledged that the bacteria and pollutants from illegal dumping create health hazards and attract rodents and mosquitoes. The U.S. Department of Justice investigated Houston’s response to illegal dumping in 2022 and found that the practices employed at the time violated civil rights and disproportionately affected Black and Latino communities.
“No one in the United States should be exposed to risk of illness and other serious harm because of ineffective solid waste management or inadequate enforcement programs,” Assistant Attorney General Kristen Clarke said at the time.
The city agreed to do better but there were no provisions related to illegal dumping in the 2027 budget until Salinas proposed an investment of $3 million for cleanup, prevention, and enforcement efforts across chronic dump sites in Houston neighborhoods. The initiative received unanimous support and it’s one reason Salinas says she voted for a budget she believed was flawed.
“I couldn’t, in good conscience, work with the community, have them come out and fight for this amendment and then vote no to stop the very change that we fought so hard to make,” Salinas says.
The council also backed Salinas’ proposal to help eligible seniors, low-income residents and people with disabilities pay the monthly trash fee through an existing utility assistance program.
But the assistance program won’t help Henderson, because she’s in an apartment that she pays for with a disability check, and the fees will be assessed to her landlord. She says she’s certain the rent will go up.
The Disconnect Between 311 and Solid Waste
Ila Owers says she thinks there’s a disconnect between 311 and whatever department they’re communicating with. “They’re either not getting the messages or the department they’re communicating with is not responsive,” she says.
She called 311 twice in the past month: once for the trash left in her yard and once about a dead squirrel near a neighborhood Starbucks. The squirrel was picked up in less than two days.
“In the past, it has taken more than a month to pick up dead animals in very public places with multiple calls to the council office,” Owers says. “There was a dead cat on the corner at Cyclone Anaya’s on I-10. It took, I want to say, five weeks for them to pick it up. You’d put in the 311 report and they’d close it out, and the cat would still be there. I finally called [Texas Senator] Molly Cook’s office and it was picked up that day.”
Solid Waste isn’t responsible for picking up dead animals; that’s an animal control matter, but it further illustrates the disconnect that just because a call is made to 311, the matter isn’t immediately resolved, Ila Owers said.
Salinas says she knows there’s a disconnect, and she wants the public to continue to push for accountability.
“When you make a complaint call, you should be confident that it’s not just dismissed or marked as resolved unless it truly is resolved,” she says. “I know that happens, unfortunately, more often than not. If there are outstanding requests that we have not resolved, we need to be honest about that.”
Panzarella says he doesn’t think 311 is the problem; they’re just the middle-man communicator. “I think 311 is functioning really well,” he says. “The issue Houstonians are having is not 311. It’s the fact that we continue to underfund critical services like Solid Waste.”
Pollard agreed that 311 isn’t responsible for actually resolving the tickets. “I think 311 is just the bare minimum of communication and submission. It’s just to log it, but it’s not to address it,” he says. He tells his J City constituents to call 311 and get a service request number, then follow up with his district office.
“We will forward that message on to the appropriate department and find out who is the lead contact for that particular issue,” he says. “You have to walk each submission in that way. If you just expect each submission to make it through the tunnel on its own, it’s probably not going to work. We’re the fourth largest city in America with hundreds of requests coming in each day. Our office will walk with that request until it is addressed.”
When TJ Owers heard that Pollard’s staff personally guides 311 requests through the process, her eyes lit up. “Do I have to live in J City to call him about our trash?” the District C resident said. Pollard says he doesn’t know of any other council members who follow up on every 311 request they’re made aware of, nor do any others use district funds for a contracted collection service.
Ila Owers says she’s hopeful that, whether the Solid Waste Department needs better equipment, more trash collectors or a simple culture change created by restructuring, they’ll resolve the problems soon and provide better service.
“If you can’t do the small things, how are we going to do the big things?” she says. “It’s like, dude, come on. Just get the trash picked up.”
