A special meeting of Bradford City Council has been scheduled
for 9:30 a.m. Tuesday at the McKean County Courthouse in
Smethport.
“We’re going to go over to Smethport and get together with the
Solid Waste Authority and talk and see if we can resolve some of
our issues,” explained city solicitor Mark Hollenbeck on
Wednesday.
The meeting will begin at 9:30 a.m., and then will likely
adjourn into executive session to discuss the ongoing litigation
with the authority, he explained.
“Everyone thought it would be best to get together as many
participants as necessary,” he said. Because a quorum of council
members may be present, the council decided to hold a special
meeting for general purposes.
The litigation involving the Solid Waste Authority has been
ongoing since 2003, when the authority sued the city and Bradford
Township for taking their trash outside the county for disposal – a
move which the municipalities made in response to the authority’s
raising of tipping fees to $86 a ton.
In March of 2004, Judge John Cleland signed a court order
setting the tipping fees at $48.50 a ton and designated the
Hutchins landfill as the only receptacle for waste generated in
McKean County.
That order has remained in effect since then.
At the end of August of 2005, the landfill was sold to Rustick
LLC. What impact that will have on the litigation has yet to be
seen publicly.
In addition, the final version of the McKean County Municipal
Waste Agreement Plan update was completed in July. It allows for
trash to be hauled to several locations outside the county. The
plan will be in place until 2015.
Hollenbeck said that Tuesday’s meeting has been scheduled for
some time as a conference in the case. When asked if a resolution
was expected during the upcoming meeting, he said, “I have no
expectations other than the parties have both expressed a
willingness to continue talking.”
The reason the meeting is being held at the courthouse,
Hollenbeck said, is because Cleland has offered his assistance to
the authority and municipality.
“The court has expressed a willingness to get involved in our
discussion if we feel that it would be helpful,” Hollenbeck
said.
However, Cleland has been off work because of an injury and it
was not immediately clear Wednesday night when he would return to
the bench. Judge John Yoder and Senior Visiting Judge Robert Wolfe
have been handling matters during Cleland’s absence.
While the special council meeting will be held in the morning
Tuesday, there will still be a regularly scheduled council meeting
at 7:30 p.m. in city council chambers in Bradford.
