Seeking to turn around what has been characterized as a failing business, the Lycoming County Commissioners have hired the Clinton County Solid Waste Authority to manage the facility, which the commissioners have said is $27 million in debt.

The move comes after months of rumors and outright statements from the commissioners that the Resources Management Services department which ran the landfill and transfer station was in much worse condition financially than they and the taxpayers had been told for years.

An off-hand admission recently by one of the commissioners that what was needed was a management company to oversee the operations of that department seemed to signal the direction the commissioners were moving which culminated in this week’s vote.

The two-year agreement puts Jay Alexander, who is the general manager of the Clinton County Solid Waste Authority and his son Cody, who will work directly at the Lycoming County landfill, in charge of the county’s facility. Cost will be $20,000 per month, which was listed on the meeting’s agenda as a budgeted item. Shannon Barnes,director of management operations explained what funds will be used to finance the management of the landfill.

“It is technically part of what would be normal administration fees associated with running the landfill, so the fee to manage will come out of the proceeds from the landfill. So, I would say, with that, it would be a “budgeted” item. It was not specifically added to the 2026 budget as a “management fee,” Barnes said.

“We have also been looking to hire a management company for a few months now, and that fee is what we set as the maximum we would pay to manage. There were no negotiations with that amount. It was all we were willing to pay to whomever we chose to manage it for us. So that amount was rolled into our annual administration fees.

Commissioner Marc Sortman said that the board has confidence in the Alexanders’ abilities.

“They have years of experience…they’re committed to this new direction of Lycoming County and I think that although change is very, very difficult, this is the right change,” Sortman said.

“It’s going to allow us to evaluate the existence of that landfill as a county-owned facility and move it forward into the next generation,” he said.

Commissioner Scott Metzger noted that the county years ago had formed a partnership with Clinton County for the Joinder Board, with commissioners from both counties sitting on that board.

“It’s been a successful board over the years and we’re hoping for the same type of partnership here going forward,” Metzger said.

In other actions related to the finances of the county, the commissioners continued their streamlining of personnel, when they and Controller Nikki Gottschall, acting as the Salary Board, approved the following changes: delete a maintenance manager and two maintenance III positions at the prison from the TDA. (table of distributions and authorizations); retitle facilities foreman position to construction supervisor in facilities management and add a maintenance manager and two maintenance III positions at the Prison to the TDA.

Sortman noted that these changes were made to tear “down walls that bring together a team.”

“We had two separate teams doing the same job,” Sortman said.

He explained that the commissioners had worked with the head of Facilities Management, Cameron Boyer, to determine the responsibilities for his department.

“Some of the concerns in the past was the prison’s 24-hours, seven days a week. If the air conditioning goes down, it needs to be fixed immediately. Cam made the commitment that the prison would be first on his list when things like that happen and at the same time maintaining the other facilities of the county,” Sortman said.

The commissioners also approved the following items: the tire waste permit renewal; the 2026 grant award for the Lycoming County victim witness services in the District Attorney’s office in the amount of $121,593; An amendment to an agreement with William Miele, increasing it to $125,000 for work on a capital case; the certification of county funds for the 2026 Program Year in the amount of $56,639 for ag land preservation; and the invoice for PA Friends of Agricultural in the amount of $7,800 for 2025.

Appointments approved included: Brett Taylor to the Planning Commission; and Matthew Buck and Herman Logue to the Industrial Development Authority.

A motion to appoint Jim Dunn to the Planning Commissioner was defeated.

Commissioner Scott Metzger was re-appointed to the SEDA-Council of Governments as the county representative and Howard Frye as the county’s second representative/member-at-large.

Under personnel, the commissioners approved: Angela Lockridge as a clerk III in adult probation at $17.11 per hour; Hunter Black-Murray as a maintenance III in facilities management, at $24.38 per hour; Zachariah Zelewicz, as a corrections maintenance supervisor in facilities management at $65,838 per year; Courtney English, as a full-time JPO court scheduler, at $19.36 per hour; and Christine Wenger, as a part-time correctional officer, union, at the Prison, at $21.42 per hour.

The next commissioners’ meeting will be at 10 a.m. Feb. 5 in the Commissioners’ Board Room, 3rd floor, Third Street Plaza, 33 W. Third St.