ATHENS, Ohio – Two Athens County government entities have officially formed a council of governments for waste services — the first of its kind in Ohio — and the city of Athens is poised to join them.
Representatives of multiple area governments met at the Athens County Commissioners’ office May 16, where the Athens-Hocking Solid Waste District and the village of Amesville formally agreed to create the Southeast Ohio Recycling Terminal COG and approved its bylaws.
Athens County Commissioner Lenny Eliason was named chair, Amesville Mayor Gary Goosman as vice-chair, and AHRC Executive Director Crissa Cummings as secretary, treasurer and fiscal agent.
The public meeting allowed the COG to officially register with the state. After 30 days it may conduct business, if no hiccups occur.
Initially proposed as the Southeast Ohio Area Resources COG, the SORT COG will absorb Athens-Hocking Recycling Center, Inc.’s assets and infrastructure. The COG will contract with local municipalities to provide recycling, compost and refuse services in Athens and Hocking counties.
Official formation of the COG follows months of organization meetings (spearheaded by AHSWD Director Jane Forrest Redfern), public comment and concern.
Founding of the council of governments means that AHRC facilities will remain in operation, retaining local jobs.
The SORT COG is “a really exciting step in potentially re-envisioning a future and making for a much more stable organization” for locally controlled solid waste management, Cummings said.
Present at the meeting were Nelsonville City Council Vice President Nancy Sonick and Logan City Councilwoman Judie Henniger, both of whom serve on their cities’ respective utilities committees, as well as representatives from Athens Township, the Athens City-County Health Department, and Rumpke Waste & Recycling.
SORT’s next meeting will be at 10 a.m. Monday, June 17, at the Foundation for Appalachian Ohio, 35 Public Square, Nelsonville, following the solid waste district’s meeting at 8:30 a.m.
Athens poised to join the COG
Both Logan and Nelsonville are pursuing membership in the COG. For months, however, the big question has been whether the city of Athens — whose decision in late 2023 to contract with Rumpke for trash services precipitated the AHRC crisis — would join.
If Athens opts to contract for services to the COG, it could break its contract with Rumpke with 60 days’ notice. The city was aware of the potential formation of a COG for waste services in December 2023 when it contracted with Rumpke.
At council’s April 17 meeting, Patterson revealed that the snag lay in the COG’s proposed bylaws, which allot one vote to each member’s one representative no matter how many customers are involved. Athens would have significantly more customers than COG members but no greater voice, Patterson said, which he said was “rather lopsided.”
The city had proposed a weighted voting system but, Patterson said, one of the county commissioners called that a “dealbreaker.”
In an apparent compromise, “the city administration endorses the concept of creating a Council of Governments related to solid waste and recycling based on the agreement and bylaws hashed out by the working group,” Stone told the Independent in a May 8 email.
At Athens City Council’s May 13 committee of the whole meeting, Stone told the council that the agreement included a requirement “that the method of voting be reviewed by the board every three years.” The agreement states that this will begin after the fourth year of operations.
“We thought that that was sufficient to meet the concerns that we had,” he said.
Council will hear the first reading of an ordinance to join the COG at its next regular meeting on Monday, May 20. A second reading would occur on June 3, with the third and final reading on June 17.
The city’s ordinance to join the COG “doesn’t obligate the city to do anything other than to join,” Stone said.
Councilwoman Solveig Spjeldnes, 1st Ward, asked why Athens wasn’t one of the COG’s founding members; Stone said it came down to timelines.
“Somebody had to form it,” Stone said. “But we didn’t want an agreement that was unacceptable to all of the members before at least those two entities formed it.”
Other members are expected soon, according to records obtained by the Independent. Logan City Council will hear first reading of its COG ordinance on May 28, setting it up to formally approve membership by June 17, and Nelsonville’s proposal needs to move through committee.
“The health district, including our board, are in an information gathering phase around the SORT COG; there is no timetable for any additional actions,” Jack Pepper, an administrator at the Athens City-County Health Department, said in an email.
The cost of the COG: A countywide tax
Municipalities joining the COG will pay an annual $500 membership fee. Additionally, the solid waste district wants to implement a $12 annual parcel fee — a property tax — for its own operations and to underwrite the COG.
The tax would apply only to improved parcels, which is land with buildings, Forrest Redfern said at Athens’ May 13 council meeting.
“We decided that a way to sustainably move the COG, as well as the district forward, was to institute a $12 per improved parcel fee for every improved parcel in the district,” Forrest Redfern said.
The district expects the fee to generate $750,000, with “over $400,000” going to the COG, Forrest Redfern said.
Residents of the solid waste district get good value for their money, she said.
“If you come to one of my recycling days, you can get rid of tires for 50 cents apiece – that’s a pretty good deal,” Forrest Redfern said.
The parcel fee also would allow the district to buy the land where AHRC sits, at 5991 Industrial Drive in Athens.
“With this parcel fee, over the next few months, we will be working with AHRC and the COG to purchase the recycling center so that the recycling center, the (materials recovery facility), the compost facility and the land will be preserved for the district and not be sold to the highest bidder,” Forrest Redfern said. “It will always be there and the COG will then be able to operate it on behalf of the district and on behalf of the members.”
The solid waste district board will vote on the parcel fee at its June meeting.
