A county councilman fighting the plan to put a trash transfer station in his district says the site's $2.9 million purchase wasn't "done properly."

Councilman Dion Guthrie is continuing to urge residents to come out and protest against a bill before the council which will clear the way for development of the transfer station on the former Coleman Plecker property off Route 7 near Route 152 and I-95 in Joppa. The public hearing on Bill 11-62 will be at 7 p.m., Tuesday, Jan. 10, at the AA Roberty Building at 102 S. Hickory Ave., in Bel Air.

Guthrie says he plans to offer several amendments to the bill in an effort to delay, if not cripple, the project and says the county should have gotten an independent appraisal of the 24-acre property in the 800 block of Philadelphia Road in Joppa before it bought it last summer.

Ben Lloyd, a spokesman for County Executive David Craig, confirmed there was no appraisal; however, Lloyd also said an appraisal wasn't "necessary."

Guthrie, who represents Joppa and nearby Edgewood, has been outspoken in his opposition to the transfer station site during both county council and local community council meetings.

He said he may introduce legislation that would force the county government to have an appraisal done on the property, a former golf range and pro shop that has been vacant for a few years since the former owners of Coleman Plecker's World of Golf went out of business and moved away.

County looked elsewhere

According to Guthrie, the county had originally looked at a property on Route 40 between Aberdeen and Havre de Grace that was owned by the late Sen. Bob Hooper. An appraisal commissioned by the county valued the Hooper property at $4 million, Guthrie said, but the deal to purchase it fell through.

When the Plecker property, which is much nearer than the Hooper property to the incinerator at the end of Route 152 in Magnolia, was purchased, the county made adjustments from a "very comparable piece of land" and applied it the property on Route 7, Lloyd wrote in an e-mail Tuesday.

He did not specify where that comparable property was or who owns it, but a high placed county source in addition to Guthrie confirmed it was Sen. Hooper's property.

Because of the original appraisal, Lloyd wrote, "it was not necessary to pay for an additional [appraisal]."

Guthrie believes, however, that comparing the two different pieces of land at opposite ends of the county is "like apples and oranges."

While the acreage for both properties is similar, he said, the Route 40 property is in a much more densely populated area of Harford County off a busy highway with much commercial development nearby. The Plecker property, Guthrie said, has 56 homes near it.

Appraisal not required

A check of both the county charter and county code sections pertaining to real property acquisition indicate there is no mandatory requirement that the county obtain appraisals of property it plans to purchase, although most governments typically get some kind of independent appraisal before they enter into a purchase contract.

The code states in part, "No property or interest therein shall be acquired, by condemnation or otherwise, unless adequate funds for the same shall have been included in the capital budget…," which appears to be the limit of the council's role in such acquisitions since the council does approve the capital budget. The council also must also authorize the taking of property by condemnation, which was not an issue in this acquisition. Conversely, the code requires that in most instances where the county is disposing of real property, it must do so at the "appraised value" of the property.

During December's Edgewood Community Council meeting, Guthrie said the other council members are "pushing hard" to put the transfer station in Joppa, because it isn't within their districts.

Since recycling and trash transfers are already done at the Harford Waste Disposal Center in Street, also home to the Scarboro Landfill, Guthrie says that's the obvious location for the transfer station.

"There doesn't need to be a bill for that," he said. Guthrie added that in a conversation with Craig, the county executive told the councilman that "he doesn't care" if the station was placed at Scarboro or on Route 7. In an interview earlier this year with Aegis editors, however, Craig said he felt a transfer station in the lower end of the county (Street is considered the upper end) would benefit many residents who could take their own trash to the station, something many don't do now because of the distance between their homes and Street.

Up in arms

The residents Guthrie represents are up in arms over the Plecker site. "They're very upset," he said.

"They [the residents] are going to have to deal with this forever. It's going to destroy their property values," Guthrie added.

Guthrie said he plans to introduce an amendment to Bill 11-62, which authorizes the station to be built on the Plecker property and was introduced by Councilwoman Mary Ann Lisanti and Councilman Joe Woods earlier this month. Among other things, the bill requires a 150-foot buffer "next to any adjacent residential lot and along any public road," and also states: "To the extent possible, all buildings on the site shall be located and configured in a manner to maximize the distance between the buildings and adjacent residential lots."

His amendment, Guthrie explained, would dictate that the transfer station cannot be within 500 feet of a residential property and must have a buffer of 200 feet around the station, requirements that would effectively exclude the Plecker property.

"It's probably going to be a small war," Guthrie joked about the reaction he expects to receive.