Dear community members,
First of all thank you for making our Rake and Take curbside bagged pine needle pick up program such a success. It really shows our agency and the entire Prescott area how conscientious and proactive our community’s attitude toward wildfire safety is. Keep up the good work, and remember that this service is available year round, not just during the warmer months of the year.
Secondly, due to reasons beyond our control, there will be a slight price increase for this service. Starting July 1, 2020 the price for this service will now be $2.00 per bag.
The original price of $1.00 per bag was based on an average weight of a typical 42 gallon lawn bag of pine needles. Over the last couple of months we have been experiencing a trend of residents using larger sized bags filled with debris other than pine needles such as scrap wood, household trash, pet feces, and lots and lots of dirt, gravel, and rocks. Not only does this make the bags heavier, therefore more expensive to take to the dump, but in many cases the overfilled bags used are not rated for this type of application and inevitably tear. Our personnel then must divide the spilled contents, usually into 2 of our bags, that we carry for other Defensible Space services that we provide the community.
Unfortunately our agency cannot afford to absorb these additional expenses and rather than discontinue the program all together, we have chosen to introduce a slight increase in order to preserve a program, that many Groom Creek residents have expressed to our agency is a valuable resource, for wildfire prevention.
Thank you for your understanding and continued support,
Ernesto Manzanedo
Fire Chief
Groom Creek Fire District
