City council members will discuss an ordinance during Monday night’s meeting that could extend the compost pilot program into June for further expansion and data gathering.
The compost pilot program ran for six months and ended on December 31, 2018. Athens-Hocking Recycling, or AHR, is now asking the city for an extension of the contract. The extension would help AHR better gather data on the effectiveness of composting in the city.
Mayor Steve Patterson said in a council meeting last week that the program has been successful so far. Councilman Pat McGee, I-At Large, has expressed his concerns with the city funding a program in the past. McGee believes that the city could promote backyard composting.
The cost of the composting program is $6,100 a month. Deputy Service Safety Director Ron Lucas said that even if the composting program expanded under the new contract, the cost would stay the same.
Two ordinances involving the Bounty on the Bricks fundraiser will be introduced. One ordinance will request a street closure between Union and Washington Street during the event, which will take place on Aug. 3.
The other ordinance will suspend enforcements of parts of the Athens city code during the event. That would allow for vending to take place in a designated area during the event. It would also suspend code rules for peddling and soliciting.
Bounty on the Bricks has taken place for seven years. It is hosted by Ohio Health, who last year raised over six million pounds of food for the eight counties.
