by Catherine Rierson
Staff Writer
The Orange County Board of Commissioners received a revised list of prospective sites for the county’s solid-waste transfer station at a work session Tuesday night.
The new list, which shifted the Rogers-Eubanks Road community from fourth to eighth on the list, should be whittled down even further at the board’s meeting next Tuesday.
The new top four sites are on a one-mile stretch of N.C. 54 near Orange Grove Road. The rankings were managed according to community-specific criteria, such as environmental-justice concerns and municipal logistics, established by Olver Inc., the consultants the county hired last November. The new criteria came after the initial ones were slopped, because the board wanted the process to be more objective, chairman Barry Jacobs said.
Commissioner Mike Nelson said five sites would be too many to name at next week’s work session, but said the board wasn’t ready to make a decision on just one either.
“I tend to want to minimize the amount of people we alarm with naming new sites, so I’d prefer to select a lower number,†Commissioner Moses Carey Jr. said. “Everyone is affected by this. We all throw our trash away but not always in our own back yard.â€
Sarah Timmel, a disgruntled resident of Cornwallis Hills, a subdivision that rests close to the border of one of the two Hillsborough sites, agreed. “This is right beside our neighborhood,†she said. “It’s all just beautiful forest, but it’s like they don’t care because it’s near a highway. Our property value will just go straight down.â€
No public comments were made at the work session, though the commissioners did unanimously agree that public hearings should be held after every instance in which the list of sites is thinned down, at minimum.
The board also objected to Olver Inc. responding to communities’ concerns in the upcoming public participation phase.
“People are not going to feel like they’re being heard,†Carey said. “People need to be able to connect to us directly — and on both sides of the county.â€
The board hasn’t changed the deadline of Nov. 18 for its final decision. However, it did express concern about finishing before the new board is elected on Nov. 4, which would give the voting responsibility to new commissioners. The board said that it wouldn’t, however, rush through the process, because it was more important to make the right decision.