Harrisburg Mayor Linda Thompson on Monday proposed ending a five-year-old incinerator fee agreement with the Harrisburg Authority public works agency that she said would redirect $275,000 per year to Pennsylvania’s distressed capital city.
The legislation, which the City Council is scheduled to consider Tuesday night, would rescind an agreement between the city and the authority that waived the municipal benefit fee of $1 per ton of solid waste received at the trash burner in exchange for storage space there that the city has used.
The bill would “facilitate the administration’s efforts to move that revenue stream into the city treasury,” said Thompson, who praised the authority’s board for its assistance. The authority owns the incinerator.
Harrisburg, which is operating under state-appointed receivership, has $310 million of bond debt related to cost overruns to a project to retrofit the incinerator.
The legislature last week extended a ban on any city bankruptcy filing until Nov. 30. Critics say assets sold before a filing would pay off Wall Street creditors while leaving Harrisburg with stranded debt.
