Representatives for both Waste Management and the City have apologized after a Waste Management collection agent verbally abused the owner of a local business during an attempt to collect a trash bill that was in error.
Two weeks ago, Key West The Newspaper reported that a tough-talking Waste Management bill collector entered the Mail Spot and threatened co-owner Bill Harmon.
"He told me, in front of a store full of customers, that unless I paid what he said was an overdue bill, he would call Code Enforcement to pull my occupational license off the wall and put me out of business," Harmon said. "He was rude and loud. I had never been spoken to like that.
"I told him that the bill was in error and that his management knew that it was in error," Harmon said. "When I refused to write him a check, he stormed out of the store. Within five minutes, Code Enforcement officer Ron Clark was there, apparently to help in the collection effort."
But, according to a Jan. 11 memo by City Utilities Director David Fernandez, explaining the incident to the City Manager and the City Commission, Clark said that he showed up to help Harmon— to see what could "be done to defuse the problem . . ."
"The City employee (Clark) did not participate in collection activity and made no attempt to revoke the occupational license," Fernandez said. "In fact," Fernandez said in a letter to KWTN, "no business can lose its occupational license for solid waste infringements without due process. No code enforcement officer has the right to close down a business or `pull the occupational license off the wall' for sewer or solid waster issues."
In his report, Fernandez said that his investigation had confirmed:
• The Mail Spot did not have a delinquent balance. Waste Management records were incorrect.
• The Waste Management employee had not been trained for account collection or public relations.
• The bill collector did threaten that he would have the City pull the Mail Spot's business license.
"The Waste Management employee's conduct was clearly inappropriate," Fernandez said. "Waste Management has assured me that this employee will not be allowed to do collections or customer relations again.
"And Waste Management has agreed not to allow employees engaged in collection activity to interpret the code or represent what action may be taken by the City.
"Furthermore," Fernandez said, "Solid Waste Code Enforcement does not and will not participate in Waste Management collection activity."
"I'm happy to have the apology," said Bill Harmon. "But I've just received my new bill from Waste Management. It's wrong."