Trash District Seeks Fee On Construction Debris

By Scott F Davis

Posted: November 25, 2009 at 5:27 a.m.

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FAYETTEVILLE — Customers disposing of construction debris at Waste Management’s Eco Vista landfill in Tontitown may soon be required to pay a fee that has been the sticking point of litigation.

The Boston Mountain Solid Waste District board voted Tuesday to clarify its rules to require a fee on both household trash, known as Class I waste, and construction debris, known as Class IV waste.

The proposed rule change will require published notices and public hearings before it can be approved by the board at its next quarterly meeting or a special meeting, said Maylon Rice, the district’s director.

The landfill’s management has been collecting and paying the district’s fee of $1.50 per ton on Class I waste, but it had not been collecting or paying the fee on its Class IV waste, officials said. This revenue funds the Boston Mountain district, which serves Washington and Madison Counties.

The board is trying to establish a fee on Class IV waste that its leaders already thought the district was entitled to when it filed a lawsuit against Waste Management in April. The district claimed in the lawsuit the landfill company owed unpaid tipping fees - dating back to 2001- on construction debris, estimated to be more than $700,000.

Waste Management responded by challenging not only the district’s authority to charge fees on Class IV waste, but also on the Class I waste, off cials said.

The landfill has since been paying those fees under protest, said Rice.

Both sides indicated Tuesday that setting up a new rule was a key step toward resolving the legal dispute.

“We’re hopeful it can be worked out,” George Wheatley, a public relations spokesman for Waste Management, said in an interview. “I was pleased to see that set up today.”

“We recommended this procedural change,” Wheatley said. “You can’t just go and exact a fee unless there is a law.”

Waste Management has not been collecting the fee on construction debris because the district’s regulations onlyallowed it to collect a fee on household waste, Wheatley said.

Former director Thomas Hodges said in April he discovered the problem last year when he was preparing the 2009 budget after he speaking with landfill employees.

Washington County Attorney George Butler told the district board he doubts the district’s ability to win the lawsuit and collect the disputed past fees.

“It’s highly problematic,” Butler said. ‘There are certainly some defenses (for Waste Management).”

Rice told the board that the state Department of Environmental Quality is withholding funding on an $85,000 electronic waste transportation grant- pending receipt of the district’s 2008 audit.

Auditors will be at the district beginning Dec. 14 and will be done by the end of December. The 2009 audit will begin soon thereafter, Rice said.

Rice said agency off cials have assured him the funds will be released as soon as the audit is complete.

“They’ve cut the checks,” he said.

News, Pages 4 on 11/25/2009

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