City of San Diego Trash Fee Unconstitutional? – Decision Forthcoming
At 1:30 p.m., Friday, October 10, the plaintiffs and residents of the City of San Diego who have expressed strong opposition to the Environmental Services Department trash fee, sighting that it is unconstitutional, will learn the outcome of their lawsuit. The judge presiding over the case will hear from attorneys, Michael Aguirre and Maria Severson, who are representing the plaintiffs, and the attorneys representing the City of San Diego. Aguirre and Severson will reply to opposition to the plaintiff’s motion for preliminary injunction.
The matter involves a trash collection fee being imposed on residents, many who are on a fixed income and lack sufficient funds and is billed by the County Tax Assessor.
San Diego voters narrowly approved a ballot measure in 2022 to repeal a century-old law that guaranteed free trash pickup for single-family homes. Voters had been told the monthly fee was expected to be between $23 and $29.
This year, after signing off on a $4.5 million study of what would be an appropriate fee, San Diego officials unveiled a plan to charge homeowners almost $48 a month in the first year, a figure they later reduced to $43.
In June, the City Council voted 6 to 3 to impose a $43 monthly charge — a fee they planned to add to San Diego County property tax rolls to make sure the city will collect all the funds.
Even before the council adopted the fee, a group of property owners contested it in San Diego Superior Court, arguing it charges more than the service costs to deliver and therefore violates the California Constitution.
In a September 14 Union Tribute report it described the city’s “chaotic” implementation of the program and stated that fewer than half of the 20,000 households losing city pickup have secured private haulers, with many facing rejections, steep rates or a maze of complications.
Meanwhile, most of the 225,000 homeowners who now must pay for city service still hadn’t chosen their bin sizes online before the September 30 deadline, with many complaining of poor or confusing city outreach.
Over the last several months, many people throughout the city have sighted the following as flaws and misrepresentation with the trash fee program:
1. Trash fee was designed to help reduce the City of San Diego’s bloated budget deficit, not specifically for trash costs.
2. The City of San Diego failed in communicating properly to the homeowners in the city so that they fully understood the costs and future ramifications. (We are told that some non-English speaking households couldn’t read or understand the flyers.)
3. Adding the annual charge to homeowners’ annual tax bill can create undo hardships on those who may have a discrepancy with the accuracy of the charge but will not be able to contest the fee and must pay the tax bill regardless).
4. During the court session on Thursday, August 7, the attorney representing the City of San Diego recommended that homeowners “sue the city” as individuals if they are unhappy with the trash fee and service. How is this protection of the public welfare if the public must take legal action to settle a disagreement at a cost born by the individual citizen. (There is something wrong if the city’s attorney makes this statement to the judge and the plaintiff’s attorneys.)
5. Misleading collateral materials that were structured to confuse and reduce response from homeowners.
6. Cost almost doubled from the original plans to charge for services.
7. Why do we need new containers if the ones we have are in good condition? What is the environmental impact of replacing one container for another? Isn’t this being wasteful and costly?
8. How many more people will be added to the Environmental Services Department to oversee this effort? What is the added cost for information technology, added staffing and the benefits?
There are obvious signs, as noted above, that staff of the City of San Diego was looking for a means to create confusion about the trash Solid Waste Collection Fee, because it planned to use the funds to deal with the extremely bloated City budget.
Fifteen plaintiffs are a part of a lawsuit to oppose the trash fee as proposed because it charges for services not rendered.
On October 10, 2025, the judge presiding over this case will make his determination on whether to approve an injunction to stop this program from moving forward.
Category: Events, feature, Government, Housing, Lawsuits, Local News, Taxation
