Missed and delayed trash pickups by a private refuse company that brought pests and foul odors to housing complexes across the island were the result of ongoing staffing shortages.

Kirk Tengan, general manager of West Oahu Aggregate’s refuse division, told the Honolulu Star-Advertiser that the recent spike in pickup issues is due to the company’s struggles with recruiting drivers coupled with current employees’ absenteeism.

“They’re getting back on track now as we speak,” Tengan said Wednesday. “Drivers are returning back to work (after being out) for various reasons, so they’re able to catch up, and we had a couple of new drivers that have been training, so they’re putting them on the road now.”

Tengan said six front-load truck drivers have been out recently for various reasons, including sick leave, personal leave and workers’ compensation, but that they’re all coming back throughout this coming week. According to him, total cleanup can be expected by mid-week. Until then, the drivers working currently are picking up coverage.

“Our drivers all have established assigned routes, so after their assigned routes, we’re having (currently working drivers) go to the areas that don’t have coverage right now and help pick up,” Tengan said. “I’ve also even had to contract with a sub-vendor to go out. That’s really not cost effective, but in order to get them service, we have to.”

Having drivers cover areas outside of their established routes is difficult as well, Tengan said, especially in areas that are much more dense, like Downtown Honolulu, Kakaako or Kalihi.

“To have them go and supplement, which means after they’re done with their routes, they have to go and pick up, you only have a certain amount of time in a day to do that,” he said. “That’s the challenging part.”

Tengan said West Oahu Aggregate has faced staffing shortages since the coronavirus pandemic. Prior to then, the company consistently saw people with commercial driver’s licenses — the license necessary to drive a garbage truck — walking in wanting to apply. But that after the pandemic, the company was “lucky if we had one person that applied in a week.”

According to Tengan, the company has “tried every avenue” to recruit — job database websites, recruiting companies and TV advertisements.

“I don’t know where all the CDL drivers went. I don’t know if they moved away. The pool has either gotten smaller, or they’re not wanting to work in the refuse business,” said Tengan.

The shortage of CDL holders has been felt not just by West Oahu Aggregate, but across the state, in a lack of school bus drivers and delivery truck drivers that transport goods from docks to shelves.

But even when a new driver is hired, they typically won’t be hitting the road to service customers for another four to six weeks as they go through route training, lessons from senior drivers, and for some of the drivers hired straight out of CDL school, learning how to drive a front-load truck.

“We don’t mind training them out of CDL school, but those (drivers) haven’t really driven before, and it’s very intimidating because there’s so many moving parts to it,” Tengan said. “Some of them don’t last, so we’ll have to move them into a different segment of our commercial pool.”

According to Tengan, the company would have to hire between eight and 10 more front-load drivers to comfortably serve its entire customer coverage base.

The need for a larger workforce was exacerbated by West Oahu Aggregate’s acquisition of Aloha Waste Systems of Honolulu last July — when Tengan said West Oahu Aggregate really began running short.

“The drivers that we did bring over from Aloha Waste to service their routes already had established routes when we acquired them, so we had banked on their drivers coming over with them, which they did,” he said. “But for one reason or another, they had already either applied for other jobs or had the chance to move away.”

Tengan said that West Oahu Aggregate had already been close to capacity when it acquired Aloha Waste, so the increase in service area coupled with the loss of drivers posed the problem.

“Since then, we’ve been able to merge some of their routes, but we haven’t completed that because in order to merge them, we need to hire more drivers,” said Tengan. “To successfully merge 100% of it, we have to get more drivers. We’ve been kind of behind the eight ball ever since then.”

The company also acquired all of Aloha Waste’s contracts — including a majority of Hawaii Public Housing Authority contracts.

Until last week, dumpsters at Punchbowl Homes, a facility managed by the housing authority, overflowed with trash due to missed and delayed pickups. Tengan confirmed that Punchbowl Homes reached out to West Oahu Aggregate about the issues. The trash was cleared last weekend.

The state Department of Health is not involved in regulating trash pickup unless there are issues related to vector control that are causing a public nuisance.

“We do get involved with things that may be related to vector control, like if there was an out-of-control infestation of flies or rodents, but otherwise, it’s up to the property owner to make sure that the trash is contained properly, and how often the trash is picked up is usually a contractual issue,” said a DOH spokesperson.

Tengan said he apologizes to all affected by the shortages and that the company is trying its best to improve services moving forward.

“After a while, apologies don’t really work, it’s the action. We’ve been trying our best to subcontract out and have our guys (cover),” Tengan said. “We’ve been trying our best to service, and it will improve and it’s already on the way to improving again. We just need to keep that consistent and try to keep our guys healthy so that they come to work.”