Greg Hee, a district director for Scott Waste Inc., was at Tuesday’s Fiscal Court meeting to present a increase/decrease grid scale for a fuel surcharge to Logan County customers.

In July of 2008, Scott representatives came to fiscal court asking for a fuel surcharge because of rising fuel costs. The court allowed a 20 cent increase on customers’ monthly bills to help off-set that increase with the option of taking it off when costs went down.

Now that fuel prices have dropped considerably, the court had suggested dropping the charge all together and asked that a representative from Scott come to a meeting.

Hee said he understood why the court wanted to drop the charge but said no one knew what fuel prices were going to do. The grid scale suggested by Scott would allow for the July charge to come off now bringing the three month base rate for customers down to $40.75. The current rate is $41.35.

Hee said if the court approved the grid it would allow Scott to increase the fuel surcharge only if fuel went up past $2.55.9.

The grid reflects a surcharge of

.25 percent =$0.10 per quarter

1.00 percent=$0.41 per quarter

1.50 percent=$0.61 per quarter

3.00 percent=$1.22 per quarter

Magistrate Harold Prince saw no reason to accept Scott’s grid saying he thought the court needed to just take off the surcharge all together and then if fuel went up again Scott could come back and ask.

Magistrate Dickie Carter thought it would be too much trouble. He said he read in the newspaper about Scott coming to the court last year to add the surcharge and how it took a lot of time. He said this way if the court agrees to the grid it can fluctuate as needed.

Magistrate Jo Orange was leaning towards what Prince was saying wondering why the court didn’t just take it off all together.

Magistrate Thomas Bouldin thought it was a fair request and made a motion to accept the grid as well as drop the original 20 cent surcharge allowed in July.

This puts customer’s basic rate back down to $40.75 per quarter unless fuel goes up to a certain amount. There is a 3 percent cap that Scott can charge.

Magistrates Dickie Carter, Jo Orange, Thomas Bouldin and Judge Chick voted yes with Magistrates Harold Prince, Curtis Watkins and Loyd Houchens voting no. The motion passed.