WEST LEBANON — People dropping off trash or recycling at the Lebanon landfill will be required to prove they are eligible to use the facility under a new system that will take effect later this year.
Starting Sept. 1, staff at the landfill along Route 12A will ask to see a permit proving those arriving are from one of 23 Upper Valley communities allowed admittance, Lebanon Solid Waste Manager Marc Morgan told the City Council on Wednesday night.
Commercial haulers also will be required to obtain permits, Morgan said, adding that the new program will help officials better track what types of waste are coming to West Lebanon and who’s bringing it.
Permits also would prevent people from outside member municipalities from accessing the landfill and its services, potentially saving space in the landfill, he said.
Currently, people aren’t asked to provide identification when purchasing punch cards that are required to drop off residential waste.
“This provides a bit of enforcement of those contracts that we have with our participating communities,” Morgan said.
There will be two options to obtain a permit in the coming months, either online or in-person.
Morgan said people could opt to request a free permit on Lebanon’s website or go obtain one for $10 at City Hall. For those who go the online route, a permit would be emailed and could be stored on mobile phones.
On arrival at the landfill, a staff member would request to see the permit and scan a code that would create a ticket that tells the city who’s dropping off waste and how much.
“At this point, there’s no pay option attached to this digital permit but it’s being built with that intention,” Morgan said, adding that punch cards could someday be phased out of use.
He said officials toyed with the idea of instead requiring people to obtain a sticker for their vehicle, similar to those in use in other communities. But with so many Lebanon residents transitioning between temporary and permanent housing, “we see a lot more people renting trucks, borrowing trucks,” Morgan said.
“And so attaching a permit to a vehicle just doesn’t make a whole lot of sense in the society that we live in today,” he said.
Morgan said a “soft launch” of the system will go live in the next 30-60 days. That effort, he said, should give officials an early indication of any problems before the full permitting program goes live on Sept. 1.
Hanover is in early talks to join that trial, according to Peter Kulbacki, the town’s public works director.
“We’re talking to people in our Sustainability Committee to see if there’s some folks in there who might want to be early adopters so they have a chance to see how easy it is,” he said Thursday afternoon.
Tom Kennedy, district manager of the Greater Upper Valley Solid Waste Management District, said he’s heard that each of the 10 Vermont towns covered by the district will be presented with a new agreement to use the Lebanon landfill in conjunction with the permitting system.
GUVSWD member towns include Bridgewater, Hartland, Norwich, Pomfret, Sharon, Strafford, Thetford, Vershire, West Fairlee and Woodstock.
As in Hanover, he said, those communities are in talks to educate town hall staff on how to walk the public through signing up for a permit.
However, Kennedy added, there are some worries that Vermonters who don’t use credit cards would be unable to use the landfill once Lebanon moved away from punch cards and starts taking payments through the online permitting system.
“I think it’s wait-and-see,” he said of the upcoming changes.
Along with Lebanon, Hanover and the GUVSWD communities, the other towns that are eligible to use the Lebanon landfill are Canaan, Cornish; Enfield; Grafton; Lyme; Newbury, N.H.; Orange; Orford; Plainfield; Hartford; and Fairlee.
Tim Camerato can be reached at tcamerato@vnews.com or 603-727-3223.