Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, March 11, 1992 TAG: 9203110267
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B-1 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: CATHRYN McCUE
DATELINE: BLACKSBURG LENGTH: Medium
But that's what would happen under a proposal to charge for trash collection according to how much a person's garbage weighs.
Wesel and another Blacksburg resident, Lawrence Sabatinos, told Town Council on Tuesday night that they're against the plan, which is an idea included in Town Manager Ron Secrist's recommended 1992-93 budget.
Under the plan, residents would pay $21.22 every other month for weekly trash pickup - $4.25 more than they now pay for the service. They would get 48 stickers, each one allowing for up to 25 pounds of garbage to be picked up.
Without the sticker, trash bags would not get picked up. Extra stickers would cost $3 each.
The plan is an alternative to raising the bimonthly collection fee to $25.52, which would be necessary because of increasing landfill costs in Montgomery County.
But the two residents, both elderly, said the weight-based plan would attract varmints and would be a burden on low- and fixed-income people.
Sabatinos said that if he and his wife didn't generate 25 pounds of garbage one week, "I'd have to save that stinking stuff until I got . . . 25 pounds."
Reading from a 2 1/2-page typed letter to council, Wesel said that under the plan each person would pay $127.32 a year for the town to collect 1,200 pounds of garbage.
"Now, according to my figures, it is going to cost $23.70 to put that in the landfill, which leaves $103.62 to go to the hauler and/or others," Wesel said.
He also objected to Secrist's statement that the weight-based plan would "encourage" residents to recycle more, instead saying the plan is coercion.
He urged the town to tighten its belt in other ways to reduce the costs to residents for garbage collection.
Later in the meeting, Secrist gave council the overall recommended budget of $9.15 million. It includes:
Adding a landscaping division to handle the town's extensive landscaping and tree-planting program, including the South Main Street project.
Adding a new fund to handle fees and costs to operate the swimming pool on Patrick Henry Drive, scheduled to open this fall.
A 1 percent increase in the meals tax, to 4 percent, which would generate $246,000 annually to cover street maintenance and other essential work.
Secrist said the town's finances remained strong, despite the recession and the stagnation at Virginia Tech - the town's biggest employer. He said it's the first time in his 19 years of public service, all of it in university towns, that the university was stagnant.
Council will hold a work session tonight at 7:30 in Town Hall to discuss the trash-collection idea and the town's financial forecast.
In other matters Tuesday, Town Council:
Approved an amendment to the German Club development plan, allowing for an 8,355-square-foot expansion of the Manor House, with a multipurpose room seating up to 270 people. It also includes 75 additional parking spaces, and eliminates 12 family town houses called for in the original plan, approved in 1979.
The German Club Alumni Foundation Inc. plans to build 12 student apartments, as originally planned, but not for 10 or 15 years.
Approved a special-use permit for the Reynolds Aluminum Recycling Co. trailer to remain in its location on University City Boulevard.
by CNB