Nye County Commissioners delegate authority to approve tipping fee waivers.

This week, the Nye County Commission approved an adjustment to its newly established landfill tipping fees, the second such change since the tipping fees went into effect five months ago. Now, the Nye County manager has the ability to authorize waivers for entities such as government agencies and nonprofits so they can utilize the county’s dumps without charge. It was a move criticized by some but welcome news to others, particularly to those who appreciate the efforts of these entities in keeping the county’s lands and roads clean.

“This obviously came into question because we [previously] didn’t charge anything for anybody, other than commercial stuff, at the landfills,” Nye County Manager Brett Waggoner explained during the commission’s Tuesday, Dec. 2 meeting. “There have been some instances out in the rural areas - Tonopah, Round Mountain – where BLM or NDOT has had a need to dump and they have been turned away. That’s what brought this to light.”

The agenda item at hand was sponsored by Nye County Public Works Director Tom Bolling, who explained that the county had been approached by the Bureau of Land Management, Nevada Dept. of Transportation and local nonprofit CleanUp Pahrump with requests for the landfill tipping fees to be waived.

“They regularly remove trash and debris from public land, private property and roadways,” Bolling told the commission. “Public works supports these waiver requests but only the BoCC (Board of Nye County Commissioners) can currently authorize waiving fees for the landfills.”

Looking to streamline the process and keep the commission’s agendas from being clogged with tipping fee waiver requests, Nye County District Attorney Brian Kunzi had suggested the commission delegate that authority to the county manager.

“If this item is approved, public works will move forward with preparing Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) agreements with NDOT, BLM and CleanUp Pahrump and any other verifiable nonprofit that would like to do cleanup in Nye County – and that’s all of Nye County, not just Pahrump,” Bolling said, noting that the MOUs would then go to the county manager for signing.

A draft MOU was included with the request, outlining that the waivers will only apply to non-hazardous solid waste generated from cleanup activities conducted by the given agency or entity. “Waste must be non-hazardous, legally acceptable under the landfill permits and properly sorted in accordance with county landfill regulations,” the draft MOU states.

As it stands today, there is dwindling space at the landfill that serves Nye County’s largest community, Pahrump, and the cost of operation for all the county landfills and transfer stations has been on the rise. These two factors are what prompted the establishment of tipping fees in the first place and many have expressed frustration over the requirement to pay at the dump for anything other than regular household trash or, on Saturdays, green waste. Some public commenters at the Dec. 2 meeting expressed opposition to allowing government agencies free use of the landfills that residents are charged to use but Nye County Commissioner Bruce Jabbour pointed out that the garbage that is going into the landfills with these types of agencies is garbage that is littering the county’s communities.

“The fact of the matter is, this debris, this trash, this garbage that NDOT and BLM and these nonprofits are picking up around Nye County, is all of our crap. It’s all our trash,” Jabbour asserted. “It’s our stuff and we’re responsible for this.”

Commissioner Debra Strickland made the motion to approve the delegation of authority to waive landfill tipping fees for government agencies and nonprofits, with a second from Jabbour. The motion passed unanimously.

For more information on the Nye County Landfill tipping fees, visit CandSWaste.com or call Nye County Public Works at 775-751-6262.

Contact reporter Robin Hebrock at rhebrock@pvtimes.com