By Mark Powell / Times of San Diego / May 6, 2025
As San Diegans continue to struggle with the rising cost of housing, a new financial burden has made its way into our monthly expenses. If you own a single-family home in San Diego, you will now have to pay to have your trash picked up.
This will have a long-lasting impact on both home affordability and the rental market. In other words, it will make homes and housing less affordable.
The city of San Diego’s proposed trash collection fee, which was pitched to voters as a modest cost-recovery measure, is now estimated to be around $50 a month. While that might not seem like much to some, for many working families, seniors on fixed incomes, and first-time homebuyers, this seemingly minor monthly charge could be the tipping point that pushes homeownership out of reach.
Every $50 increase in monthly household expenses can reduce a buyer’s purchasing power by $8,000 to $10,000. That’s not an opinion; it’s a fact based on interest rates and mortgage qualification formulas used by lenders. A $600 annual fee for trash pickup may not sound catastrophic on its own, but in the context of San Diego’s already sky-high home prices, it’s one more barrier stacked on top of many others that are keeping people out of the housing market.
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What’s worse is that voters were originally told the new trash collection fee would be in the ballpark of $23 to $29 per month, a much more digestible figure. But like many ballot measures, the devil is in the details and now we’re looking at almost double that amount.
It’s not the first time local voters have been led astray by misleading ballot language or vague financial projections. However, the responsibility doesn’t rest solely with the elected officials who promoted this measure, it also lies with the voters who approved it.
We can point fingers at city leaders who downplayed the full cost or failed to implement meaningful cost-cutting alternatives. However, we must also recognize that voters themselves have a duty to do their homework before checking a box. Too often, ballot designations are worded in a confusing or misleading way, and campaigns are driven by professionally produced commercials, social media ads, and mailers that tell only one side of the story.
We live in a city where more than 40% of seniors already don’t have enough income to cover basic needs like housing, food, healthcare, and transportation. Adding another $600 a year to their fixed expenses may not sound like much to a policymaker, but for many of our seniors, it’s the difference between staying in their home or being forced to make hard choices.
Renters won’t be spared either. While the fee is targeted at single-family homeowners, landlords will almost certainly pass that cost on to tenants, especially in single-family rental homes that don’t already pay private waste collection fees.
Renters in San Diego are already facing record-high costs for gas, electricity, water, insurance, and healthcare. Adding another fee to their monthly obligations only accelerates the financial squeeze. With San Diego’s median home prices consistently ranking among the highest in the nation, even the smallest new fee, tax, or charge should be examined through the lens of how it affects housing affordability.
For those who oppose the new trash fee, there is still time to take action. Property owners will receive a protest form in the mail. Fill it out with your name, address, and signature and submit it to the San Diego City Clerk by 2 p.m. on June 9. If more than 50% of affected homeowners file formal written protests, the fee can be stopped.
And if the City Council moves forward despite community opposition, voters still have a second chance: collecting signatures from 5% of San Diego’s registered voters, about 120,000 people, within 30 days can trigger a referendum. If enough valid signatures are gathered, the City Council must either cancel the fee or place it on the ballot for a public vote.
This isn’t just about trash collection, it’s about transparency, accountability, and the cumulative effect of local policies that continue to erode affordability for everyday San Diegans. We must reject the notion that “it’s just a small fee.” In a city where people are already stretched to the breaking point, every dollar matters.
Let’s hold our leaders accountable, but let’s also hold ourselves accountable. Read the full ballot text. Ask questions. Demand honest numbers. Because when it comes to affordability in San Diego, we’re either part of the solution or part of the problem.
Mark Powell is a licensed California real estate broker and the former vice president for the San Diego Association of Realtors.
The mindless renters who voted for this with no skin in the game out of shortsighted spite with misguided equity issues. That would be like a homeowner voting on your next rent increase for trash fees. Good ol Elo watching out for your wallet, my ass.
This is what I don’t understand. This isn’t “equity” and I’m in CM Elo Equity’s district. How can all the renters be able to vote on this to put it into place, but our entire voting age households are not allowed to vote this out?
I am a condominium owner in the city and have had to pay to have my trash disposed of for the last 30 years! Single family homeowners in the city have not had to pay for trash removal for more than a century thanks to the “people ordinance” passed in 1919. In 2022 voters voted for Measure B to begin charging homeowners for their trash removal. Now, many San Diego homeowners are belly aching and whining because they finally have to contribute to trash removal costs. CRY ME A RIVER! So these very same people now want to do the TRUMPIAN thing and overturn the will of the voters! Boo Hoo!
Same John drivel, you volunteered to pay that trash in a co-op with your neighbors. But you’ll learn after our rates go into effect, I’m sure your rates will go up also. Pat your self on the back. Congrats!
Pat, Pat. Boy that feels good! Enjoy paying those trash rates!
As usual, you seem to be uninformed. Homeowners have been paying for trash removal in property taxes. This idiocy that people actually believe homeowners have been getting a free trash removal service boggles the mind. Anyone with an ounce of plain common sense would know that no one gets ANYTHING free from a city government. If it cost them money, they are recovering it, and have been “for more than a century.”
And now we will be paying double–same Property tax and now new tax on the trash service.
John, the ballot measure was cooked with bait and switch pricing – it only passed by under 1% and only 3,000 voters would have been needed to switch if the true price was posted. All the errors were in the city’s favor to get it passed.
SD has been known for bogus Measures that have been overturned, etc. at heavy costs to city finances. This thing needs a redo or to be bidded out to private haulers.
Now, the UT has an article stating a city audit shows the city is underchargiong for tipping fees at Miramar. Timing is suspecious. They’ll probably up the tipping fees, which will mean private haulers will have to raise rates to make the SD proposed rates not so outrageous.
I’m wondering if things can get worse in SD for its citizens?
Checker players just can’t see that far ahead.
Paul, it may have passed with a 3000 vote margin, but it still PASSED. Now, you sound just like DJT calling Georgia and asking them to find 11,779 votes. I am not opposed to bidding the process out to private companies, but the voters approved Measure B, so we ought to follow through with the will of the voters. If you want it changed, get a new measure on the ballot and put it up for a vote. You’re right about the fact that given the pricing now being discussed, many might change their minds.
Couple of things. I’m maybe too lazy to check but what was the majority of voters who voted to let them add another expense on property owners and by implication renters? Was it a Prop 13 super-majority? This still is a new tax. Now we will be paying (in our property tax bill) the same amount we were paying to have garbage removed and yet another fee on the same bill to have our garbage removed. This seems like double taxation. (I can’t believe I’m saying this because I’m not usually agains taxes.) I’m harping on double taxation because the city government–Mayor and City Council–is impervious to any discussion of the merits of this boondoggle or of the alternatives. So I suggest hammering on double taxation. Hell, at this point I still have a pickup (ancient as it is) and I’d rather take my own garbage to the dump like we used to do…
And the automatic 2% bump on property taxes. Reassessments on additions and home sales. Last year was a record year I remember reading.
How about a a tax on dog excrements?to pay for the free baggies provided by the city?
That go into any available trash can, local neighbors or city parks…
Plastic +shit, heavy burden on our landfills…
Recommend a dog shit tax
Yeah, good idea.
It’s unbelievable how many dog owners walk by my greenery and recycle containers that are out on the curb before or after pickup and PUT THEIR DAMN POOP BAGS IN THEM!!! To all of the clueless, mindless, selfish idiots who do this: I wish you very bad luck in all things!
Measure B was passed by less than 1/4 of eligible voters. And I’d bet that a large percentage of them did not read the voter pamphlet, but only the ballot title, and think they voted for free bin replacement. Ignorance is how we got here. And don’t forget the trash fees will be added to short term vacation rental prices. Welcome to San Diego. And FYI, for my condo at Pacific Isle I pay $16.26/mo for trash and recycling service. The “equitable” fee rhetoric is either a lie or a mistake. Either way, does the City Councilmembers have the integrity to rectify the fallacy and folly with their vote?
Thanks for the info on your fee. I’ve asked the “John” commenter here who wants revenge fees on everyone what he pays, but no info.
Honestly, Honesty, I do not recall you asking that question. If you look at the conversation thread, I do not see you posing that question. The answer is….. much more than you have been paying for the last 100 years! But I have a question for you as well. Would you rather people not pick up their dogs excrement? Where would you rather have people dispose of their dogs poop?
I want people to take their stinking bagged dog poop home with them and not toss it into my blue or green recycle bin after the trash pickup!! So how much do you pay for monthly trash service??? (I did already ask.)
I tell you what,I’m opting out, I’ll shred all identifying personal info. that would normally go in my trash, and my trash will be dumped in the alley behind my home for the city “TO PICK UP FOR FREE”
Been paying for trash pickup via property taxes for years.
OddTodd must be low on photo-op funds.
While some argue that voters have a responsibility to educate themselves before casting their votes, I strongly disagree in this case. The fact is, the creators of the ballot measure provided misleading financial estimates that shaped public understanding. What is now being proposed is materially different from what voters believed they were supporting.
There should be legal safeguards to prevent ballot language from presenting estimates that are so inaccurate. Voters deserve transparency and honesty—not misleading figures that undermine informed decision-making.
Does anyone know if a legal challenge is being considered? It’s difficult to argue that the original cost estimate wasn’t misleading—especially given that a significant portion of voters likely based their decision on the $23 to $29 per month figure presented in the ballot. This is an estimated 69-72% difference in price – hardly immaterial!