White Co “Hemorrhaging” Money Paying For Transfer Of Trash

White County Commissioner Derrick Hutchings said the county is hemorrhaging money by the way it is currently operating its trash operations.

The White County Solid Waste Committee spent more than two hours Monday night discussing rate increases. Hutchings said the county needs to try and offset the costs by reevaluating rates that have not been updated in several years.

“Right now, I feel like we are trying to survive and keep costs as low as we can and maintain it,” Hutchings said. “All of costs have went up. We are trying to survive until we get a new cell open. Then, we can adjusts those.”

The county is spending over $10,000 a week to transfer residential trash to a Morrison site. The landfill cell has been closed to household garbage since August as the county tries to gain state permits to open a new cell.

Commissioner David Cranford questioned the end game for the landfill during the work session. Cranford said the county needs a plan to fulfill before worrying about fees.

“We got a lot of things that are going to have to be addressed and have a vision of where we are going before we throw a bunch of money at something,” Cranford said. “I know we have to do something right now. I totally understand, but are we going to raise it now and turn around and raise it later when we find out what the true numbers are?”

Hucthings said the possible increases right now is just to maintain hauling trash. Hutchings said once the new cell opens, the county will start accepting out-of-county trash to help pay for the operation.

The Solid Waste Committee decided to recommend a 20 percent increase to tipping fees bringing it to $60 per ton. All other rates were tabled contingent on gaining more information.

County Executive Denny Wayne Robinson said moving forward, he needs a direction from the commission as to who will operate the landfill when it reopens. Robinson said the county can either transfer trash, lease or keep ownership.

“The business model for everybody around us in the area is private entities can handle this better than governments can,” Robinson said. “Everybody is leasing out everything. Don’t know if that is right just cause everybody else is doing it. That’s the business model.”

Robinson said the county remains in limbo as to when residential trash will be accepted once again.