MAHANOY PLANE - The Gilberton borough solicitor will look into whether the borough can require someone who leases a Dumpster to empty it at the local transfer station.
Mayor Mary Lou Hannon raised the idea at Thursday's meeting of the Gilberton Borough Council. The borough uses the North Schuylkill Transfer Station, which she is suggesting should be used. In the long run, it could help keep dumping fees low for all customers.
"Right now, there was no increase (in fees) this year. We allow Dumpsters to come into the borough and they can take the materials anywhere," Hannon said. "Everyone has to have the borough to pick up the trash and you can't take it yourself."
"Well, you could, but you still have to pay the borough (the garbage fee)," solicitor Karen Domalakes said.
"Well, they (residents) are taking the Dumpster materials to Northumberland County or wherever," Hannon said. "If someone has a Dumpster, it should be taken to the local transfer station. It would keep our disposal costs down."
"You mean that if someone privately contracts for a Dumpster?" Domalakes said. "Well, first of all, if you wanted to enforce it, it would have to be by ordinance. However, I would hesitate on dictating who our residents can do business with. That's what we would be doing. We would be telling residents do business with that landfill."
"We're telling our residents now that they can only do business (household trash collection) with Gilberton borough," Hannon said.
"No, we're not," Domalakes said. "They can contract with anyone they want to take their garbage."
"But we still charge them, right?" Hannon asked, to which Domalakes said, "Right. That was established in the borough that the borough can do. I do not think that it is an established power (as a borough) that we can say which landfill they can use for garbage that falls outside of what we will pick up as regular household garbage."
Domalakes will look into the matter and return with an answer at the next meeting.