Jackson officials have released that the city is looking for a way to reimburse residents for unperformed sanitation services as the second week without any trash collection services continues.
City Attorney Catoria Martin stated during Tuesday’s city council meeting that the municipality is currently researching if it can legally reimburse a portion of this month’s sanitation funds to paying customers that are within Jackson limits.
“We have been researching whether or not we can actually give residents a reimbursement,” Martin said. “I think legally, we can. The question is how much of a reimbursement we can give citizens.”
Martin explained that the majority of the city’s 150,000 residents pay $35 a month to have their garbage picked up at their homes twice a week, with some Jackson citizens pushing for a full reimbursement for the month of April after all trash collection services ended on March 31.
“We are right now calculating what the amount would actually be,” Martin added. “I assume it would be a small amount… I don’t know exactly how much it will be, but what I can say is that we think legally, we can go through and run the calculations on exactly what is equivalent to the amount we are charging customers for in terms of collection.”
Jackson Mayor Chokwe Antar Lumumba reminded residents to not take their uncollected household garbage to the city landfill, as the landfill is not certified to accept those type of items.
“They have had to turn around a number of people out in Byram,” Lumumba stated. “I just wanted to make certain that residents know that they cannot take those type of items.”
City officials are expected to meet with the Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality (MDEQ) on Wednesday to discuss options on how to provide temporary trash disposal services until a long-term solution is made.
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