The Selectmen have met several times with the Board of Health regarding the Town's upcoming trash disposal contract renewal with SEMASS. Our existing 30 year contract expires in 2015 and we will be facing a substantial increase in the tipping fee. The tipping fee is the cost per ton for SEMASS to accept our trash. As you can see, we are planning way in advance to keep cost increases to a minimum.
Due to the great foresight of Town officials many years ago, Norwell presently enjoys a disposal fee of roughly $35 per ton. Surrounding Towns are paying anywhere from $75 to $100 per ton. Norwell delivers roughly 4000 tons annually to SEMASS. An increase to the market rate of $100 per ton would cost Norwell about $265,000 per year in addition to what we pay now.
To avoid having to budget for such a substantial increase, the Board of Health has recommended to the Selectmen that we blend the rate increase proposed by SEMASS over the remaining five years of our existing contract, in exchange for a preferred rate of roughly $80 per ton for the new 20 year contract beginning in 2015. Although our costs for trash disposal would begin to increase in 2011, the savings over the next 25 years would be substantial.
To help mitigate the rise in disposal fees, the Board of Health will be implementing single stream recycling, beginning in July of this year. Single stream recycling allows our residents to easily recycle all allowable items in the same container without having to separate anything. The hope is that residents will recycle substantially more than they do today, because recycling will be substantially easier than it is today.
Pick up would be weekly rather than bi-weekly to accommodate the increased volume. By recycling more, we reduce our trash tonnage, thus reducing our overall trash disposal fee.
If we all work together to recycle substantially more than we do today, our overall cost increase will be minimized because we will be disposing of a lot less trash.
The alternative is a trash fee, which both the Selectmen and Board of Health members are seeking to avoid.
We all will need to do our part to avoid the higher costs. Our Town Offices and schools are already on board.
Please watch for additional literature from the Board of Health explaining the details.
Respectfully,
Richard Merritt
Chairman
Board of Selectmen
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