HAMPSTEAD — Selectmen, not voters, will decide whether the town adopts a pay-as-you-throw trash disposal system — but they are still looking for public input.
The board voted, 3-0, Monday night to make the decision on trash and recycling, rather than put a proposal on the warrant for a vote at Town Meeting in March.
"I think the decision should be made behind this table," Selectman Richard Hartung said. "If it's worth doing, we probably ought to bite the bullet and do it."
Selectmen will not act until a formal proposal is made by the Solid Waste Committee. Selectmen's Chairman James Stewart said that will likely be in the next few weeks.
Stewart urged residents to voice their opinions to the selectmen on the adoption of a pay-as-you-throw system.
Selectmen refer to the system as SMART, which stands for Save Money and Reduce Trash. Under the system, residents are charged by the bag to dispose of their trash. The less trash people produce, the less they pay. Recycling is free.
"It's a lot fairer," Selectman Priscilla Lindquist said after the meeting.
Lindquist told the board that the switch to a SMART system might not survive a public vote.
"I think the (Solid Waste) committee feels if it goes to a warrant article, forget it," she said.
Stewart said it is a "hot-button issue" in town. He said many people are concerned about the cost of purchasing the special bags, which would be sold through the town and available at grocery stores.
"Towns would do well to think of this as a program to increase recycling rates," Stewart said. "It's not about, 'And, oh, by the way, we may save a few bucks in the town budget.'"
Hampstead's recycling rate is about 15 percent or 16 percent, said Bob Nugent, a member of the Solid Waste Committee.
Switching to the SMART system could quickly increase the rate to about 30 percent, and bring it closer to 40 percent or 50 percent in a few years, he said.
Though the selectmen will decide whether to adopt the SMART system, it is unclear what that decision will be.
"We don't know yet," Stewart said. "We've got to wait until we see the presentation."
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