Council member Gene Pease wants the Chapel Hill Town Council to get tough when it comes to improving the Rogers Road neighborhood.

Pease said at the end of the council meeting Monday that he wanted two "tough sons of bitches" on the task force that will work on a plan to bring sewer lines and a community center to the Rogers Road neighborhood, near the county landfill.

Appointing two council members to the Historic Rogers Road Task Force was the last item of business on the council's agenda Monday. Four council members were vying for two spots on the group.

Pease was not one of them, but said he wanted to make sure the people the council appointed would make sure the county doesn't make big financial decisions without input from Chapel Hill.

"Well, I want two tough sons of bitches on it," Pease said

Orange County commissioners killed a proposal Tuesday night to put new transfer station in the county and set a date to close its current landfill in 2013.

After hearing comments from about 15 people and in front of a packed meeting room, commissioners unanimously voted down a proposal by Carrboro Mayor Mark Chilton to build a transfer station on the northwest corner of the Interstate 40/N.C. 86 intersection.

Chilton proposed the site earlier this year as a way to save money and keep from having to truck garbage to a Durham transfer station.

Orange County is still looking for the best short-term solution for its garbage.

And so far, there’s snags in all the possibilities.

County leaders have decided to close its landfill and possibly truck its solid waste to Durham, but Chapel Hill and Carrboro say its too expensive.

A new task force will decide how a sewer system and a new community center will be built for residents living near the county landfill.

The Orange County Board of Commissioners, Chapel Hill Town Council, Carrboro Board of Alderman and Hillsborough Board of Commissioners consented to establish the task force during a joint meeting Thursday night.

The boards met to discuss the future of the area’s solid waste and how the county will mitigate the effects of the landfill on its neighbors.

By correspondent Tammy Grubb

The Chatham commissioners voted 3-0 during today to stop considering sites for a new county landfill.

The county also canceled four public input meetings scheduled to get more information about the sites. Those meetings were supposed to start Wednesday night.

Commissioners Sally Kost and Mike Cross missed today's meeting because of sickness and other family issues.

Board Chairman Brian Bock said county officials considered the public opposition to a planned landfill, as well as the need to look more closely at alternative waste technologies still under development.

Part of that process will include bringing residents who have come out against the landfill into the process of researching alternatives and how to pay for them, Commissioner Walter Petty said.

The county currently pays Waste Management Inc. to truck roughly 180 tons of trash per day to a regional landfill in Sampson County. The county’s old landfill was closed in 1993, because it didn’t meet new Environmental Protection Agency guidelines.

Read more about today's meeting in Wednesday's News & Observer.

From correspondent Tammy Grubb

Chatham County has cancelled Tuesday’s community meeting in Siler City to talk about potential sites for a new landfill because of expected snow and ice.

The meeting is one of four community input sessions aimed at giving residents more information about the landfill siting process and what criteria officials are using to whittle nine potential sites to three, from which the top site will be chosen. County officials also want to find out what residents think is important about each site.

The rescheduled date for Tuesday’s meeting is still being determined, officials said. However, a second community meeting that was delayed is now set for 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. Feb. 9 at Central High School on N.C. 902 in Bear Creek.

The other two meetings are scheduled for 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. Jan. 19 at the Chatham Community Library on N.C. 87 in Pittsboro and 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. Jan. 20 at the Moncure Fire Department on Old U.S. 1 in Moncure.
 

Beginning July 1, 2011, televisions and computer equipment will be banned from disposal in landfills in North Carolina. After this date, these items will no longer be accepted for curbside pickup as part of the Town of Garner's regular solid waste services.

Robert Campbell, Rogers Road's most active spokesman, will visit the White House Friday as part of a panel discussing the public health benefits of a clean energy economy. Campbell will address EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson and Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius.

"We're going to be there to interject our thoughts on how to go about creating green initiative programs to move us forward," he said. 

Campbell, a key leader in the Rogers-Eubanks Neighborhood Association and the Coalition to End Environmental Racism, has fought for public water to replace wells possibly contaminated by leeching from the nearby Orange County landfill. He has also fought  against siting a trash transfer station in his neighborhood.

"If we can learn truly to move into the green technology, it'll being to elminate the need for landfills," he said. 

Leaders in the Rogers Road neighborhood are giving the town of Chapel Hill 30 days to deliver a timeline for extending water and sewer to their community.

In a petition going to this Thursday's Assembly of Governments meeting, the Rev. Robert Campbell and Neloa Jones say Rogers-Eubanks residents have "endured the negative impact of nearby solid waste facilities on the community's air, land and water environment for more than 35 years."

In 2002, the Town Council agreed to create a small area plan for the neighborhood that was to look closely at providing water and sewer. But, Campbell and Jones write, the task force has met with no action by the town or coordination with other local governments.

"Is the task force to be yet another failed effort in the long history of promises made, expectations made and resolutions denied?" they ask. 

The petition does not say how the extensions would be paid for, only that Chapel Hill should work it out with Carrboro and Orange County. The petition includes a resolution from the Rogers-Eubanks Neighborhood Association and the Coalition to End Environmental Racism that the groups ask the Town Council to adopt immediately.

Thursday's meeting begins at 7 p.m. at Extraordinary Ventures, located at 200 S. Elliott Road across from Whole Foods. Read the entire petition here.