News Talk 94.1/AM 1600 Where The Upper Cumberland Talks
Jackson County has received a $52,000 grant to help improve solid waste infrastructure.
Mayor Randy Heady said around $18,000 will be used for engineering, designing and building a structure for recycling.
“We want to recycle, but you have to have the infrastructure to handle your recycling. What I realized, upon being appointed into the mayor’s position, was that we didn’t have the room to do our recycling ,” Heady said. “I can’t store very much cardboard and plastic so that’s why we need an engineer for a building. If we are going to do recycling, we’ve got to expand that.”
Heady said the county will also purchase a new forklift and 10 additional cardboard collection cans.
“At this time, we have almost 30 cardboard recycling cans around Jackson County,” Heady said. “I’m looking for 10 more because there are people calling all the time wanting a cardboard dumpster.”
Heady said the grant will be a huge benefit as the solid waste department relies almost entirely on property taxes.
“Besides what we sell, every dime that we use in solid waste comes from the property taxes,” Heady said. “If you think about that, we’re receiving $52,000 in this grant. If we didn’t get the grant, we wouldn’t be able to do this because we wouldn’t have the funding.”
Jackson County will be required to provide a $6,000 match towards the grant.
