SPRINGFIELD TOWNSHIP Trustees disagree over landfill talks

Waste Management had offered to pay the township $600,000 over 20 years.
By MARY GRZEBIENIAK
VINDICATOR CORRESPONDENT
NEW SPRINGFIELD -- Negotiations to forge a host communities agreement with the Waste Management landfill on State Line Road here have been stalled for more than a year and was the subject of disagreement among Springfield Township trustees.
Trustee Reed Metzka asked Trustee Jim Holleran at a Wednesday night meeting why Holleran has taken over negotiations with the landfill company.
Metzka had been trying to get Waste Management to agree to pay the township $1 per ton for every ton of waste dumped at the landfill instead of the 25 cents minimum required by the state that it now pays.
Instead, last year, Waste Management offered the township $30,000 per year for 20 years, an amount trustees rejected.
Holleran said he is talking to landfill representatives because Metzka's refusal to compromise on his demand has left negotiations stalemated for a year.
"The $600,000 is still on the table, and we've already lost a year's interest," Holleran said.
Doesn't need money?
Metzka said the township doesn't need money from the landfill, adding that once a township signs a host community agreement, the landfill's expansion requests would be automatically approved by the state.
He said he would never sign an agreement with the landfill unless it agreed to provide the township with enough money to lower its tax millage.
Metzka added that all three trustees should be in on any agreement made with the landfill.
Trustee Shirley Heck said that signing a host community agreement could bring much-needed funds into the township.
She said even after an agreement is made, the township could still go back and make revisions.
Holleran said he has not yet approved anything, adding that any agreement would come before all three trustees for a vote. He added that Jerry Ross of the landfill told him no expansion is planned for at least three years. He added that the landfill has been a good neighbor.
Also on agenda
In other township business, Metzka said trustees "will take a long look" at what to do now that a new 1-mill continuing levy for the police department was defeated in the November general election.
"We don't want to lay anyone off," he said, and added that the request will again be put before voters.
Metzka also renewed his call for the four townships that have no police departments to pay something for their coverage by the Mahoning County Sheriff's Department, especially in light of cutbacks in that department caused by defeat of the 0.5-percent county sales tax in the general election.
Metzka said it is not fair for the four townships -- Berlin, Canfield, Ellsworth and Green -- to receive free coverage from the sheriff while other townships are assessing their residents millage to pay for police departments.