Mayor announces deal to build new waste transfer station in Fall River

FALL RIVER – The city may soon have a new waste transfer station after recently partnering with a Rhode Island-based company to build one at the site of the city’s old incinerator on Lewiston Street, Mayor Jasiel Correia II said in a Thursday afternoon press conference.

“I think today is going to be part of the story that will be told about the conclusion of the trash debate in Fall River for the next hopefully three generations or next 30 years,” Correia said in a press conference at Government Center.

The city has signed a memorandum of understanding with the company River Environmental Solutions LLC, which Correia said has committed to invest between $2 million and $10 million in construction of the transfer station. Correia said the facility could be constructed and operational within the year and that the city would not be responsible for any of the construction costs associated with the project.

According to the city’s memorandum of understanding, RES would dispose of and process up to 1,000 tons of material per day. The facility would also be open to surrounding communities, but Correia did not say exactly which municipalities would likely use the waste disposal service apart from neighboring towns.

Correia, who is under federal indictment and facing a recall election on Tuesday, also highlighted how the transfer station could become a revenue generator for the city once finished. He said the city would collect $2 per ton based on a 1,000 ton permit, which Correia estimated would bring roughly $750,000 into the city annually.

The mayor alluded to a possible new transfer station during an interview with The Herald News last month. When asked about how the city might offset money lost by his decision to abolish the city’s pay-as-you-throw purple bag program, Correia said new revenues could be produced by a transfer station that processed trash from Fall River and surrounding communities.

As a way of being “proactive” about the city’s soon-to-expire contract with its current transfer station operator, Republic Services, Correia initially told The Herald News that the new transfer station could bring in as much as $500,000 annually.

Once the city’s current contract expires, Correia said, Fall River will enter into a new contract with RES to process the city’s trash. This contract, Correia said, would retain the $65 a ton rate currently being paid and prevent the transfer rate from growing to $150 as it has in other parts of the state.

“Our trash costs, as anyone knows anywhere in the Commonwealth, have increased over a number of years,” he said. “We are trying to be proactive and prevent any of those issues.”

When asked whether the price in that contract could go above $65 a ton in the future, Correia said, “I think it will always be at cost, but that cost may rise. Of course, we can’t predict what the cost of trash will be for this company 50 years from now, but we certainly expect the ‘at cost’ will be part of the contract and maybe an escalator of some sort.”

The Lewiston Street incinerator is already the site of the city’s public works and community maintenance offices. If the new transfer station is built on Lewiston Street, Correia said, these departments would be relocated.

“The site is much larger than their needs,” he said. “We have some sites in mind for a DCM yard. I think we can still accommodate both operations either at the same site or very close by.”

While he did note that the Lewiston Street site represents the project’s “path of least resistance,” he did say it could possibly be built elsewhere. Residents in the neighborhood surrounding Lewiston Road, Correia said, are being taken into consideration as far as beautification of the transfer station and possible noise the facility might create.

Correia was unable to say how the new facility might affect traffic in the area.

“We are still looking into that. We don’t believe so,” he said when asked if the facility might have a negative impact on traffic. “We have taken into account the residents that are there. We’ve looked at the roads, we’ve looked at capacity.”

RES has also agreed to invest an additional $100,000 into the construction of a residential recycling section of the new transfer station, which would be exclusively be available for city residents to use. Once completed, the entire transfer station is expected to create no less than six new jobs.