Opinions

WILL LANDFILL DEFICIT AND ZONING BE ADDRESSED THIS POLITICAL YEAR?

Not a lot of interest was generated by the audit presented Monday night at the Franklin County Commission meeting. One item, however, piqued our interest…….the continuing deficit of the county landfill.

The landfill ran $330,000 in the red last year, a deficit which was covered by SPLOST money. This raises two questions….questions which we hope will be addressed by this year’s commission candidates. First, what changes can be made to reduce the specter of the landfill as a financial albatross? If nothing can be done, why not go ahead, close it, and utilize Banks County’s landfill?

An interesting sidelight to this question concerned a recent incident when a load of poultry wrecked on I85 near the South Carolina line. The wrecker operator, a Franklin County business, had to take the chicken to the Banks County landfill, no doubt at added cost, because Franklin County couldn’t, or wouldn’t, accept it.

What is Banks County doing right that we are doing wrong?

The second question involves using SPLOST money to subsidize the landfill. Is that what we voted for in the referenda on SPLOST? Or would we rather use the money to educate our children……and upgrade infrastructure in our cities. Sometimes it seems that the Commission forgets where most of its sales tax revenues come from when they are allocating SPLOST money.

Aside from the audit review, the only other item that got our attention was the quick response to a question on a county zoning plan. They're still working on it.

Is there a time certain when our county leadership will finally bite the bullet on this one?

Just asking. After all, it’s election year, and that’s the best time to ask questions.

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