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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 te 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 announcment 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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Posted Tuesday September 13, 2011 by Melinda Penkava

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