State College Council Approves Trash-Collection Changes; Noise-Control Measures Head to Hearing

State College will overhaul its residential trash-collection system by early 2013, Borough Council members decided Monday night.

With a 5-1 vote, they approved a plan that will expand organics-waste collection throughout borough neighborhoods and streamline all residential refuse collection with a more-automated process. (Only Tom Daubert was absent.)

The changes are scheduled to take effect in January 2013. Upfront costs, including for new, natural-gas-powered trash trucks, are expected to run about $605,500. A state grant may defray some of that.

Mark Whitfield, the borough public-works director, said the move will reduce labor expenses over the long term, ease overall environmental impact and reduce the flow of landfill-bound waste. He said the changes also will lessen the need for rate increases; under the plan, the next one, in the 13-percent range, is expected in 2017.

The borough is expected to save at least $109,000 a year with the effort.

Council President Don Hahn said public response to the overall concept has been largely positive. Only council member Jim Rosenberger opposed the plan, noting that those responding to a public survey on the matter did not constitute a majority. (About 20 percent of those approached offered a response; some 80 percent of responders favored the changes.)

Rosenberger also expressed concern over the anticipated decline in labor needs.

Whitfield has said, though, that no layoffs will be necessary. As the on-street refuse-collection operation needs less labor, he said, a borough organics-collection facility will need more. Any net workforce reductions are expected to materialize through attrition.

Primary changes under the trash plan include these:

• This summer, residents should receive new, borough-issued refuse containers. They'll include one apiece for residual, landfill-bound waste and one for organic waste, including kitchen scraps and refuse from lawns and gardens. Households that produce 35 or fewer gallons of residual waste each week will be eligible for a nine-percent rate cut.

• The borough will buy two natural-gas-powered trash trucks equipped with automated arms. On collection runs, those automated arms will pick up residents' new refuse containers at curbside. That should speed up the collection process, reduce safety hazards and ease labor needs and truck-idling habits, Whitfield said.

Under an earlier council-approved resolution, the borough is working toward cutting landfill-bound residual waste to 35 percent of the State College's total waste stream. Whitfield said the public-works department will push over the longer term to expand organics-waste collection among commercial establishments.

Among other action Monday night:

• The council agreed to hold a public hearing, likely in April, on a proposed revamping of noise-control enforcement. Explained in earlier reports (See here and here), the change would effectively raise from $300 to $500 the likely fine for first-time noise infractions. Subsequent offenses could bring fines as high as $1,000.

The approach, advocated by the borough police department, reflects residents' concerns over noise and quality-of-life issues, police Chief Tom King said. He said similar approaches in some other college towns, including Boulder, Colo., and Ann Arbor, Mich., have been effective.

Brandon McNally, who represents Penn State undergraduates at council meetings, voiced no opposition to the proposal. He said the change could, in part, help provide an incentive to strengthen relationships among students and permanent residents. He encouraged students in mixed-use neighborhoods to reach out to their neighbors before they host parties -- if only as a courtesy.

• The council heard from four local residents concerned about The Retreat, a planned private student-housing complex that would straddle the borough-township line near Waupelani Drive and O'Bryan Lane. The complex, to house more than 500 students, appears to violate the township's own standards, the residents said. Those written standards indicate that new development should not wreck existing property values or upend local harmony, they said.

The residents asked Borough Council members to do whatever they can to help stop the project, which has received tentative -- and narrow -- approval from College Township Council. Borough Manager Tom Fountaine said borough officials have relayed to the township their view that the plan is not appropriate for the intended location.

Borough Council members agreed to put the matter on a discussion agenda for next week.

• Local artists Natalia Pilato and Elody Gyekis, of the Community Arts Collective, addressed the council on their plans for a new community mural on South Garner Street. The mural, being developed for a cinderblock wall on the 100 block, will involve contributions from local school students, Penn State students and the public at large. Details are available via www.communityartscollective.org and via www.facebook.com/colorsofmusicmural.com.

• Council members gave a green light to the rearrangement of a liquor-license situation at Faccia Luna, on South Atherton Street near Allen Street. Its ownership is transferring an out-of-town liquor license to the restaurant and giving up its current license, which is designated as a hotel license.

The hotel license, affiliated with the adjacent Happy Valley Motor Inn, will be returned to the state Liquor Control Board as the motel and restaurant become less co-dependent, an attorney for Faccia Luna said. The council agreed to attach several conditions to Faccia Luna's new license -- including that it not sell containers of alcohol beverages larger than 22 fluid ounces. The restaurant operation did not object to the conditions, which were proposed by police Chief King.