Imagine Dumping Your Household Garbage Free at Levy County Landfill – It Could Happen beginning Oct. 1
By Terry Witt -Spotlight Senior Reporter
Board of County Commission Regular Meeting August 7, 2018
Major changes are in the works for Levy County residential garbage customers. Homeowners won’t be paying tipping fees to dump household garbage at the Levy County Landfill after Oct. 1 if Levy County Commissioners go forward with their current plans.
Tipping fees are charged at the landfill entrance when commercial haulers and residents bring their garbage for disposal.
Commissioners have tentatively approved an increase in the residential landfill special assessment to $116. The assessment will pay for landfill operations and eliminate the need for tipping fees, commissioners say.
Questions were raised about the assessment at Tuesday’s county commission meeting.
Commissioners will have a final chance to approve or reject the landfill assessment increase at a Sept. 6 public hearing at the courthouse.
Commercial haulers and farmers using commercial garbage dumpsters will continue to pay $61 per ton for their garbage disposal. Farmers will also pay the $116 annual assessment on their homes, the same as other business owners.
Special assessments are flat fees charged against eligible properties in the county. The county’s improved or homesteaded residential properties would be assessed $116 a year on the property tax bill.
The landfill special assessment was $25 until the commission eliminated the charge on tax bills this year. The $25 assessment paid only for the cost of closing and maintaining garbage disposal cells at the landfill. Landfill operations continue to be funded by tipping fees and property tax money as it stands now.
Commissioners would like to stop using property tax money to operate the landfill. They want more people to fund landfill operations. Unlike property taxes, there are no exemptions from special assessments. More residential property owners would pay the assessment than pay property taxes.
But the situation is a little more complicated than it seems.
What is known about the proposed assessment is that starting Oct. 1 Levy County residents would dump their household garbage at the landfill at no charge, but the county doesn’t know at this point how the elimination of tipping fees would impact the rates charged by commercial residential garbage haulers. Commercial haulers would be picking up residential garbage and dumping it free at the landfill. The assumption is haulers would lower their rates when they no longer pay tipping fees, but the county also recognizes that haulers would continue to pay overhead costs like labor and truck operation and maintenance, so the residential garbage service wouldn’t be free.
County Commissioner Matt Brooks brought up the subject of the landfill assessment at Tuesday’s commission meeting under commissioner reports. The assessment wasn’t an agenda item. Brooks said he met officials from Waste Pro, the county’s largest corporate garbage hauler concerning the assessment. He said the company agreed to add an addendum to its contract recognizing that the $116 landfill assessment eliminates tipping fees for residential customers. But the county won’t control how haulers like Waste Pro adjust their rates. Market competition will likely drive those changes.
The county has notified every hauler in the county that the higher assessment is on the way and tipping fees are on the way out, but County Commission Chairman John Meeks said the county hasn’t sent out a letter to haulers answering questions about the assessment. After Tuesday’s board meeting, Meeks said the commission will have more information available to the public concerning the assessment at the Sept. 6 public hearing.
Board of County Commission Regular Meeting August 7, 2018
Posted August 7, 2018
