COUNCIL WILL CONSIDER TRASH SERVICE SALES TAX VOTE

Barring any legal difficulties, the Cape Girardeau City Council June 6 will adopt an ordinance for a one-eighth cent sales tax vote to defray the increasing cost of solid waste.

In an informal meeting to discuss the city budget, the council proposed putting the one-eighth sales tax to the vote of the people as a way to avoid raising trash fees from $10.54 a month to $12.13.

"If we let the people decide whether they want the one-eighth sales tax and they decide against it, we can still put this back to the solid waste task force and ask for another solution," said City Councilman Melvin Gateley, who suggested putting the one-eighth sales tax to a vote of the people at Thursday's meeting.

City Attorney Warren Wells said he would have to check to see if it is legal to proceed with the proposal for a one-eighth sales tax on the August ballot. "If it is legal, you would need to move quickly to get it on the August ballot," said Wells. "You would have to proceed with all three readings at the next city council meeting," he said.

Mayor Al Spradling III pointed out that the proposed increase in fees is just one way to deal with a problem that will not go away.

"What it comes down to is that we're going to have to bite the bullet," said Spradling. "We could accept the fee increase now and then if we want to go to volume-based pickup, we could take care of that with a rollback," said Spradling. "Any way we look at it, we're going to have to come up with the money to avoid taking the money from some other area of the budget."

Last week, city officials opened proposals from trash haulers interested in taking over the city's residential trash service.

The city has turned in the lowest bid thus far. "We answered questions from a half dozen companies who attended the pre-bidding meeting," said Assistant City Manager Doug Leslie. "Some companies were scared to death when we started talking about spring and fall cleanups and removing trash left by people who moved or just left it out on the street."

Browning-Ferris Industries of Southern Illinois bid $13.60 a month. Continental Solid Waste of Jackson bid $17.76 per month.

"When you look at some of the bids that are coming in, $12.13 is a competitive price," said Spradling.

If the solid waste task force would recommend volume-based trash billing, it would take at least six months to fully implement the system, said Leslie.

"We would have to have stickers printed up and to figure out what the average billing would be before a cost would be assessed for each trash can or bag," he said.

Gateley is in favor of looking seriously at such a system. "I'm thinking of the little old lady who is on a fixed income and is only having one bag picked up while a family might have three or four picked up," said Gateley. "Why should the woman on a fixed income be paying for a service she's not getting?"

Said Spradling, "I'm wondering if we're targeting the volume-based system in the right way. Are we thinking about the person on a fixed income and not thinking about the family with a limited income that would be paying $16 or $17 instead of $12.13?"

Another item that surfaced during the informal discussion on the budget was Spradling's proposed rainy day fund.

"That's something that would have to be put in the city charter," said Spradling. "Right now we have in reserve enough money to run the city for two months. I would like to get that up to six months."

City Finance Director John Richbourg said it costs the city $1 million a month to operate. "Raising $6 million for a rainy day fund can't be done overnight," said Spradling. "It would take a considerable amount of time, but if you said that you would save $100,000 or $200,000 each year, it could happen."

City Councilman Tom Neumeyer suggested using revenue generated from riverboat gambling for a rainy day fund.