Trash for roads debated today
April 7, 2008
By William Johnson    
wjohnson@dailyworld.com

The St. Landry Parish Council has called a special meeting at 5:30 p.m. Monday to debate a proposal to accept trash from neighboring parish to fund local road repairs.

The St. Landry Parish Solid Waste Disposal District was approached last month by IESI, which holds the contract to collect household trash in the parish, about disposing of trash from neighboring parishes at the district's landfill near Beggs.

IESI, long a major trash collector in the northern part of the state, is aggressively moving into the southern parishes, winning the St. Landry Parish contract last year and the Acadia Parish contract this year.

But with these new contracts comes a need for a place to dispose of the collected trash and it is willing to pay for the privilege.

"The dollar amount we would generate is directly related to quantity - it would certainly be in the millions," said Solid Waste Executive Director Katry Martin.

A similar debate is expected at Tuesday's Opelousas City Council meeting, which discussed the issue at last week's city general services committee meeting.

"They have a pretty good case," said Opelousas Alderwoman Jacqueline Martin, who attended a meeting at Solid Waste last month. "We could be looking at up to $5 million a year."

She said IESI has promised there will be no hazardous waste, just standard household trash.

"Solid Waste has said it has enough property and air space to handle this volume for 22 more years. I think this is a win-win," Martin said.

Opelousas Mayor Donald Cravins Sr. expressed more caution.

"There are some real concerns about waste coming into our parish. Whether those concerns are real or imaginary, they are there," Cravins said.

Cravins said he, like all the other mayors in the parish, have been asked to sign a letter of support for the plan but said he has no intention to do so until he knows a lot more.

"We need to be clear on what position Opelousas will play in terms of dividing up this revenue," Cravins said.

Accepting waste from other parishes is not a new idea. For years, the local landfill has been accepting trash from Evangeline Parish, which pays about $450,000 a year for the privilege.

The district is funded by an eighth of a cent parishwide sales tax, which pays for its day-to-day operations. Therefore, by law, any extra funds it generates can only be used for road and road-related repairs.

Every few years, when that money reaches a certain level, Solid Waste has been giving grants to the parish and its 12 municipalities. Traditionally, the money is given half to the parish and the other half is divided between the parish's 12 municipalities on the basis of population.

Parish President Don Menard said he supports the plan.

"(Solid Waste) has a proven track record. They gave the old police jury $2 million. In 2004, they gave our new parish government $1 million that we used for new, much-needed road equipment. They gave us another $800,000 just recently," Menard said.

"This can help us deal with our road problems while minimizing the cost to taxpayers," Menard said.

When the idea was first brought up last month, Council President Kenneth Vidrine was less certain. "I'm not sure it is a good idea. I don't believe in selling our parish as a garbage dump," Vidrine said.

To clear the way from such a project, Solid Waste has voted to authorize the engineering firm of Aucoin and Associates to apply for a Department of Environmental Quality permit modification to re-define the existing landfill's service area to include all adjacent parishes.

Martin emphasized the permit application does not mean the project is going forward. "This has yet to be determined. This would only happen by an act of the (parish) council," Martin said.

Menard said, in addition to Monday's special Parish Council meeting, most mayors plan to begin holding public hearings to explain the proposal to the voters in the near future.

He said, if the public response to such hearings is positive, the council will most likely vote to put the proposal on the ballot later this year