Landfill fee hike averted — for now
Fierke was main opponentBy BILL SHEA, Messenger staff writer
A hefty boost in the price of garbage collection for Fort Dodge residents and businesses has been averted for now.
But an increase seems inevitable as the North Central Iowa Regional Solid Waste Agency seeks to pay the estimated $1.7 million cost of opening a new section of the landfill. That new section will be needed in 2010.
''They're going to wind up paying more to get rid of their trash,'' agency Director Gary Schmidt said, describing how that new section's price tag will affect residents.
On Wednesday, the agency's executive committee canceled a $7 hike in the cost of dumping a cubic yard of waste at the landfill. That increase would have boosted that fee to $12 per cubic yard on Oct. 1.
Local governments and private sanitation companies would likely have passed that increase on to their customers.
Also on Wednesday, the committee directed the agency's staff and Ruan Securities, of Des Moines, to make recommendations for financing the new landfill section. That report is to be submitted by Sept. 17.
Fort Dodge City Manager David Fierke was the main opponent of the $7 increase.
''No one has shown to me that we need that now,'' he said.
''I don't want to do that to the rate payers in Fort Dodge,'' he added.
Fierke also challenged the legality of the increase. He said he doesn't believe the executive committee, of which he is a member, has the power to set rates. He said he thinks only the full agency board, made up of representatives from every community that uses the landfill and regional recycling center, has the power to set rates.
He gave committee members a written opinion from City Attorney Maurice Breen, who concluded that the executive committee can't set rates unless the full board specifically gives it the power to do so.
The agency's attorney, Larry Curtis, of Ames, also submitted an opinion on the issue.
''Our attorney says the language isn't really clear and it could go either way,'' Schmidt said.
Executive committee members voted unanimously to rescind the rate increase. Then they voted unanimously to put the staff and Ruan Securities to work on a comprehensive financial plan.
A need for new landfill space combined with new environmental rules has put the solid waste agency into a money crunch.
Schmidt said the agency will run out of landfill space in the summer of 2010. Fortunately, the agency has land that can be used. The current plan calls for turning seven acres of it into a new landfill section.
Before the contents of garbage trucks can be emptied onto that ground, it must be prepared in compliance with environmental rules. Those rules now require an immense plastic liner to be placed on the ground to prevent fluids from trickling through the trash and into the groundwater. That liner is estimated to cost $1,089, 000.
That's the biggest part of the new section's cost. The excavating and other work will cost about $600,000.
The agency doesn't have that kind of cash in the bank, making a fee increase inevitable.
The North Central Iowa Regional Solid Waste Agency serves Webster and Hamilton counties, all of Humboldt County except Bode, Eagle Grove, Rockwell City, Knierim, Pomeroy and Manson. It operates a landfill and a regional recycling center on Gypsum Hollow Road south of Fort Dodge.
Contact Bill Shea at (515) 573-2141 or bshea@messengernews.net
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BoogsDelbreaux
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08-28-08 10:14 AM
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If people in this community want to continue their hobby of garbage collection, they can pay for it themselves. I collect beanie babies and the cost is very reasonable.
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