Every week, in Arcata and Sunny Brea, a garbage truck roars up the streets. From house to house, from bin to bin. An unseen face sits behind the wheel of this massive machine for hours at a time. Picking up an average of a thousand totes before his route is completed.
His name is Zac Ramsey, and he’s the winner of the National Residential Driver of the Year Award in the regional category.
“I mean it’s pretty cool,” Ramsey said. “You do something for 24 years, and you have no idea that this award even exists. And then your GM of Recology says, ‘Hey, I’m gonna put you up for this award,’ and then he goes, ‘Zac, you won,’ and it’s like, ‘Seriously?’ And he’s like, ‘Yes, you won.’”
“But you get so used to just coming into work, doing your thing, going home. And now you’ve won something for it. It’s pretty cool. You know.” Ramsey said.
When Ramsey first started hauling trash, it wasn’t as efficient as it is today.
“When I first started working? I remember the first year I was 22. It rained. Like every day, it was crazy. I wore my dad’s logging rain gear, and it didn’t breathe at all. It was a job and it paid well, so I was here every day.” Ramesy said.
“I was riding on the back of the truck, rear load, wet, dumping bins in the bar alley, Tomos, just gross. You just you get used to it, I guess haha.” Ramsey Said.
The title ‘Regional Residential Driver of the Year’ is awarded to the best driver nominated who works for a company with fewer than 5,000 active trucks on the road. And the driver must service residential homes.
“I, you know what, I would put it, Zac is uh, is like a grown-up high schooler haha. You know, a very responsible one, a family man, but you know, when I met Zac, um, the first thing I recognized was he’s a personable guy.” Frank Nelson, Zac Ramsey’s general manager, said. “He’s really good at mirroring back the energy that you put out,” Nelson explained.
When Ramsey was nominated, he was put into a pool of hundreds of nominees out of the estimated over 140,000 active garbage men and women across the United States.
EXPANSION: Every garbage company in the United States can nominate 1 driver for every 18 drivers in their district. Ramsey was one of the few drivers nominated in Humboldt County and was put up against drivers from all across the nation, who were also nominated for the regional residential drivers of the year title. After the National Waste and Recycling Association reviewed all the letters and nominees, they decided that Ramsey was the best candidate for the award.
He was announced as the winner of his category on Tuesday, March 25th, 2025.
“If it feels great, I mean, it’s exciting, you know,” Nelson said. “You know, you don’t often get the opportunity to have somebody that you work with and admire, recognized for their qualities that you look up to them for. Having one of my employees, um, and better yet somebody that I own a business with (Recology is an ESOP, a 100% employee-owned company), recognized for the good things that they’ve done is very meaningful to me.” Nelson finished.
This is the first time that an Arcata driver has won any ‘Driver of the Year’ award, and it will be presented to Ramsey at Waste Expo 2025, which is an event in Las Vegas on May 5th, 2025.
In Arcata with the Pepperbox, I’m Levi Browne, and this was a tribute to the recently named ‘Driver of the Year,’ Zac Ramsey.
