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City won't forget $60 trash fee

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The City Commission wants to add muscle to its garbage fee collection effort and may hire a third party to round up those who’ve brushed aside the $60 fee.

The city has collected an estimated $520,000 in garbage fees out of a budgeted $600,000, Finance Director Steve Dawson says. 

Revenue Recovery Corporation – a collection agency in Knoxville, Tenn. – will handle the remaining $80,000 beginning in March if the City Commission approves the contract, City Manager Tony Massey says.

The private agency will charge about 30 percent to collect fees, Dawson said. The city will have to get about $115,000 to cover the remaining $80,000 in garbage fees and pay Revenue Recovery Corporation.

The agency collects Frankfort’s ambulance fees and has provided similar collection services for seven cities in Tennessee, Dawson says.

Massey says cities usually use third-party agencies after collecting about 80-85 percent of fees. The city has collected approximately 87 percent of garbage fees.

“We typically voluntarily get somewhere between 80 to 85 percent annual collection from (the ambulance fee) as well, so it’s very similar to what we’re seeing to this garbage fee,” Massey told the commission Monday evening at a work session.

In the future, the city may ask the Frankfort Plant Board to add the garbage fee as a monthly $5 charge rather than $60 at the end of the year, Massey told The State Journal after the session. 

When the two parties discussed the possibility of a monthly fee last year, the plant board wanted a $60,000 contract, Massey said.

While discussing the controversial fee, Commissioner Sellus Wilder questioned the legality of assessing the fee to vacant properties that don’t receive garbage collection. 

“Is there really a strong legal basis for forcing people to pay a service fee for a service they don’t receive?” he asked the commission.

City Solicitor Robert Moore says the city can legally assess a garbage fee if it doesn’t exceed the cost of garbage collection.

“The fee pays for about 50 percent of our city’s garbage collection, so our garbage collection fee certainly meets and is in compliance with the requirements of the statute,” Moore said. 

Moore added other city fees and taxes aren’t calculated by use, such as police and school taxes.

“I think we’re in a defensible position,” Moore said of the garbage fee’s legal standing.

Even though the fee’s collection rate is in line with other city services and taxes, Wilder has decried the garbage fee as a “backdoor tax increase,” and city residents have sent The State Journal numerous complaints and letters to the editor concerning the fee.

Mayor Gippy Graham and other commission members said the fee was necessary to maintain public services.

This year’s budget was “a tough pill to swallow” and the best the city could do in the wake of the nationwide economic crisis, Graham said during his state of the city speech.

In other action by the City Commission Monday:

>A representative with Stand Associates discussed the city’s long-term sewer plan, and Dawson discussed how the city would fund the projects.

Brad Derek, representing the firm, gave general background information on the need to replace the city’s combined sewer system, namely the EPA’s sewer consent decree and how wastewater ends up in the Kentucky River.

Most of the combined sewer lines are in South Frankfort, which take stormwater and wastewater to treatment plants. A small wall blocks the combined sewage and storm waters from going into the river, but heavy rains cause those waters to flow over the wall and into the river.

Derek said some renovations could be larger pumping stations, larger treatment tanks, an increased amount of wastewater storage basins and improved stormwater control, such as the impervious pavement in the Public Safety Facility’s parking lot. 

Those improvements will all depend on finances, Derek said. 

The city plans to begin work on renovating the sewer and storm water systems in 2011 and should be complete by 2018.

Derek invited the public to meetings at Paul Sawyier Public Library on Feb. 26, March 26 and April 23 from 5-8 p.m. The meetings will focus on the renovations and how they will improve the community.

Dawson said the projects would be funded by a 70-30 split between bonds and cash. 

The city will take out a $15 million bond to ensure all the money is spent within two years.

The city’s combined sewer system came under scrutiny after the EPA sued cities statewide in 2006 for violating the Clean Water Act.

Frankfort will spend between $50 and $70 million over the next 10 to 15 years to improve the city’s sewer systems under the EPA’s Consent Decree.

>The city’s trolley will begin its 40-minute route around downtown Frankfort March 2, Transit Superintendent Betty Burriss said.

A ribbon-cutting ceremony is scheduled for 10 a.m. March 2 at the Thomas D. Clark Center for Kentucky History on Ann Street, Burriss said.

The trolley’s driver will wear a uniform reminiscent of old trolley conductors and will know the history of the trolley and downtown.

The route covers several miles and will include the streets of Ann, Broadway, Capital Avenue, Mero, Main, Wapping, Washington, St. Clair and Wilkinson Boulevard. The trolley will run between 10 a.m. and 2:40 p.m.

>Frankfort will host a Kentucky Senior U.S. Tennis Association tournament in May that will generate an estimated $750,000 over a three-day weekend, Parks and Recreation Co-Director Jim McCarty said. 

The association toured the city’s tennis facilities and will hold the senior tournament here for two years, McCarty said.

The tournament will use East Frankfort and Juniper Hill parks, Franklin County and Western Hills high schools, and Kentucky State University tennis facilities, parks and recreation officials say.