More tweaking coming on solid waste agreement

    Monday’s city council meeting appeared to yield some progress on an agreement between city and county officials on solid waste.
    A council agenda item Monday included a resolution that would have withdrawn the city from the Southwest Nebraska Solid Waste Agency, after the county commissioners rejected the most recent city agreement.
    However, after some discussion with Commissioner Dennis Kunnemann, some tweaking in the agreement appeared agreeable to both sides.
    With that, the council tabled action on its resolution to withdraw from the agency.
    Commissioner Kunnemann said the county had a couple of concerns with the city-written agreement:
    1) They want assurances that county residents will be able to dump trash at the transfer station as long as it’s operated by the city of Imperial;
    2) That it provides the county departments’ right to extract road material from the site for its use as long as it doesn’t interfere with city needs.
    He also had concerns with time limits in the agreement.
    In one section of the city-written agreement, the city placed a five-year cap on depositing construction and demolition (C & D) refuse from county installations without charge, barring any state or federal regulations.
    Kunnemann said county officials also didn’t like the 10-year term on the entire agreement.
    “We want out of the agreement but want assurances that county residents have a place to dump,” he said.
     Mayor Dwight Coleman said the city’s reasoning for a 10-year term on the entire agreement has to do with unknowns in the future and unpredictable costs that might arise.

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