Members of the Buckingham County Board of Supervisors discussed the status of the renovation of the Bates Market and Gravel Hill solid waste sites during its board meeting May 14.

“I believe that (Virginia Department of Transportation) VDOT will be sending a letter,” County Administrator Rebecca Carter said about the Bates Market site. “We thought we’d get it today, but we did not. (To get) approval to go ahead and start renting it out.”

Carter said the county expects to send bids out this month.

Bates Market and Gravel Hill will be among solid waste sites in the county that are being reworked as part of the county’s adopted solid waste plan.

The plan, according to documentation from the February board packet, will seek to lower cost of its solid waste management by monitoring activities at the county’s solid waste sites.

The packet cited abuses of the unfenced solid waste sites, particularly when sites were closed during the night and at three hours during the day without monitoring.

Carter, according to the board packet, cited a high volume of furniture and other items being illegally discarded at the sites.

The county cited that landfill costs have increased approximate $100,000 since 2013. The 2017 cost for household waste, according to the board packet, was $249,750 and the construction landfill cost was $206,051, totaling $455,801.

The $455,801 made up more than half of the solid waste management budget, the board packet cited.

To prevent abuses, members of the board voted in favor of installing access control systems at each of the sites, which will include a technology-controlled arm that will let customers enter and exit the sites.

County residents will also purchase decals at $25 that they can put on their vehicles.

Members of the board cut approximately $62,771 from its solid waste management budget for the adoption of the fiscal year 2019 budget, expecting to “reduce operation cost with the new solid waste management plan,” Carter said.

The solid waste/recycle budget allocated for the county budget’s expenditures totals $807,125. There was an allocation of $500,000 for a solid waste plan. The solid waste/recycle budget for the 2018 fiscal year was $883,141 with $150,000 allocated to solid waste sites.