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Debris Update Tops Town Board Special Meeting
FEMA, Hauling & Other Hurricane Costs
September 13, 2011

O
riental’s Town Board held a specially-called meeting Monday morning, in large part to get an update on Hurricane Irene debris removal from Town Manager Bob Maxbauer.

A crew from Willis Trucking picks up C&D hurricane debris on South Water Street Monday. At the Town Board’s special meeting Monday morning, the Board was briefed on the backstory and arrangements made for that debris removal.

As reported here last week, new FEMA accountability rules caused the Town to temporarily stop using a local hauler, Phillip Willis’s trucking company, which had started to remove the debris.

Today, came some more details. The Town Manager said that the Town of Oriental had initially agreed to pay Willis 10% more than it paid him after Hurricane Isabel in 2003. (Commissioner Jennifer Roe said that amounted to $11.50 a cubic yard.) Maxbauer said that WIllis was taking the waste to a site that was not FEMA-approved.

Maxbauer says the Town also “struck out” with FEMA on two other issues: the price it was paying and the monitoring that was being done, (to make sure that loads weren’t lighter than they should be.) Had the town continued with that arrangement, says Maxbauer, FEMA would have not reimbursed the town for 75% of the expected $100,000-$200,000 associated with the debris removal. For that reason, the Town told Willis to stop picking up the debris as of 5p last Tuesday. Maxbauer says the bill from Willis at that point was about $10,500.

Monday morning debriefing. Oriental’s Town Board at the special meeting Monday morning.

The tighter FEMA rules came in the wake of Hurricane Katrina and the fraud and overspending of FEMA money in that cleanup operation. This was the first major hurricane in Oriental and Pamlico County since then.

Maxbauer told the Town Board today that no one in the county — not the towns of Oriental or Minnesott Beach, nor the county government at large — had known of the new criteria FEMA requires municipalities to meet before they can be reimbursed.

Last Wednesday and Thursday was a two-day crash-course in those regs. Maxbauer says he met with FEMA and state officials. As reported on TownDock, Maxbauer said then that he learned that an out-of-state hauler the county had hired said that he also could haul Oriental’s waste away for the same price.

Those prices were: 6.62 per cubic yard for vegetative debris and 8.02 per cubic yard to haul off the C&D (construction and demolition) debris. Maxbauer told TownDock then that he was presenting those figures to Phillip Willis to see if he would match them.

Town Manager Bob Maxbauer giving his report to the Town Board.

Maxbauer today said that Willis told him he could not do the job and make a profit at those rates. While that might’ve signalled that the Town would go with the cheaper out-of-state hauler, Maxbauer told the Town Board that he worked out another way to meet the FEMA standards and hire Willis. Instead of having a contract with Phillip Willis, Maxbauer says that Willis Trucking has, for the period of this job, “been inducted in to our workforce.” Under that plan, the Town would be, he said, “essentially the prime contractor. We’re providing the supervision.” FEMA approved the arrangement Friday, Maxbauer said.

The rate would be $10 per cubic yard for vegetative (That’s 50% more than the out-of-state hauler’s $6.62) And $13 per cubic yard for the C&D (More than 50% more than the $8.02 per cubic yard charged by the out-of-state hauler.)

Maxbauer told the Board that the out-of-state rate was more favorable because it averaged in the communities closer to the dumps on Hiway 306 and in Tuscarora, whereas, the locally based hauler coming from only Oriental would not. Nonetheless, the fact remains that the out of state hauler did also quote the Town of Oriental its $6.67 and $8.02 rates.

Crew from Phillip Willis Trucking scoops up a pile of tree limbs on Main Street Monday afternoon. It was loading one of the 11 truck loads that the crews hoped to take to dumps that day. Some trucks hold 20 cubic yards, says one monitor, others hold four times that.

Even though the Town is now paying Phillip Willis less per cubic yard than it initially was, Town Manager Bob Maxbauer says he expects the cost of the debris removal to get in to “six figures.”

At the moment, it appears the cost will not be paid directly by Oriental taxpayers. FEMA picks up 75% of the tab and the other 25% is paid, as per Governor Beverly Perdue’s announcement last week, by the state of NC.

The Town Manager said that Willis began work under the new arrangement on Saturday. His crews hauled 7 loads that day and 11 yesterday. He is using other trucks in addition to the ones in his own fleet.

(A monitor who was working in downtown Oriental Monday afternoon said that they were aiming to do 11 loads a day. Roxane Bond noted that they were loading their first truck full of C&D Monday and sending it to Tuscarora’s dump.)

Roxane Bond, one of the monitors hired — as per FEMA requirements — to watch all that goes in to the hauling trucks. Montiroing regulations were tightened and other criteria put in place after Hurricane Katrina in order to avoid a repeat of the fraudulent spending in that disaster.

Comparisons were made to Hurricane Isabel’s debris removal in 2003. Commissioenr Barbara Venturi said they were different and that the 2003 storm resulted in much more C&D debris. Irene, she said, has taken out more trees than Isabel and that’s created a question mark in just how much the final bill will be.

The cost of removing the vegetative debris is significantly less than that for the C&D. It’s $10 per cubic yard to haul away but there’s no tipping fee at the dump. (Instead, a private firm there is charging $3.72 per cubic yard to grind it up so it can then sell it as mulch and other products.) On top of the $13 per cubic yard to haul away the C&D, there is also a $38 a ton tipping fee at the dump in Tuscarora.

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Paying For What Contractors Should Do.

Speaking from the audience, Joe Valinoti, Oriental’s Solid Waste Coordinator said the duct-work and insulation that contractors are pulling out of homes should not be part of the town-wide FEMA-subsidized pick-up. Valinoti said that the contractors are supposed to be responsible for carting away those things because they charge customers for that. Ditto, he said, homeowners who are doing their own work and whose insurance companies pay them something for hauling it away.

Valinoti said that regardless of which taxpayers were footing the bill, the “big companies” doing the contracting work in homes “need to be told to pick up that stuff now.”

Town Manager Maxbauer said that he was “in total agreement” with the facts that Valintoi presented but added that practically speaking it would he hard to enforce. He and Mayor Bill sage said that the monitors following the trucks around were already supposed to be jotting down what was in the piles in front of each home and that an accounting of that could be done afterward.

One resident in the audience noted, however, that debris was being put in piles that were not necessarily in front of the homes that the debris came from.

Separated Debris Piles Means Quicker Pick Up

The Town Manager again urged that residents help the process by segregating their debris so that the vegetative waste is separate from the C&D. Putting them together slows down the process because the crews have to stop to move, for instance, a discarded dresser from atop a pile of brush. For that reason, he said, they might pass on picking up certain piles until town crews could separate them.

Hazardous Waste Question Raised

Oriental resident Missy Tenhet asked about pick-up of paint cans and other hazardous waste that went floating in garages or floated from one yard to another. Resident Mike North asked about that too, saying that his low-lying yard was the recipient of cans from other people’s garages and sheds.

In its initial announcement of the town-wide pickup, the Town did say that residents could leave a pile of household hazardous waste at curbside. But after some discussion at the Monday morning meeting, it was unclear if the haulers were equipped to do so.

“An advisory from Town Hall Monday afternoon states that the debris removal would not specifically pick up the hazardous waste.”:TOOHazWastePickUp.pdf Residents are advised to set those items aside and on October 15 take them to an already scheduled Household Hazardous Waste Collection day at the Pamlico County Courthouse parking lot.

The Town Manager updated the Board on other FEMA news and damage assessment to Town property. For one, he said, Town Hall incurred at least $10-15,000 in damage. The carpeted floor had flooded in Irene and mold is a concern. One FEMA assistant who visited last week, says Maxbauer, could only stay in the building “four or five minutes.” A professional assessment could tell more. Condemning the building, a step in getting FEMA “mitigation” grant money to then improve it, is one option as well.

He also said that a new control panel for the water plant may be eligible for FEMA funding. Also related to the hurricane is the cost of replacing the town’s police vehicle. Officer Dwaine Moore hit a tree on Kershaw Road as he was trying to drive to the Sheriff Department’s emergency gas pump to replenish supplies. Insurance money should come thru and, Maxbauer said, FEMA may pay beyond that.

Additionally, he told the Town Board that FEMA is also going to pay for the overtime hours that Town employees are working in the wake of the hurricane. He said he was also keeping receipts for items such as the dehumidifiers purchased to dry out Town Hall.

Posted Tuesday September 13, 2011 by Melinda Penkava


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