In last meeting of 2022, city council discusses recycling, eminent domain
JACKSON, Tenn. — The City of Jackson held their last council meeting for 2022.
During Tuesday’s city council meeting, they discussed a variety of topics, including a location for recycling and consideration of eminent domain for a greenway project.
The land that will be used for the greenway is located between Bemis and downtown.
Mayor Scott Conger said this land was once used by the railway, and after the railway abandoned it, the land was given back to the original land owners.
However, in the late 1980s when the railway left, they did not notify the property owners that they had done this.
The city has had the budget prepared for the greenway project for around four years.
So the city is now exercising imminent domain to acquire the land after a deal could not be made with the owners to sell the property. This means they will give the landowners fair market value on the properties and then file a lawsuit to take the property.
“So the main holdup was finding the landowners in several occasions because they don’t live here. Now it took us a long time to find all of them and now the holdup is them not agreeing to the market value that we’ve offered. So we’re having to file this to move the process along,” said Jackson Mayor Scott Conger.
Once the land is all acquired, the greenway will consist of walking and bike trails.
“And so it’ll be a, I want to say, I don’t know if it’ll be asphalted or concreted. The railbed will be. So it’ll be a true greenway. So it’ll be kind of off the path. You’re not just walking, but you’ll be able to see where you’re going, wide enough for bikes and pedestrians,” Conger said.
Along with the greenway, the council also approved the second reading of the Jackson Recycling Convenience Center. This center will be located off of Conalco Drive.
This will be a free drop-off site that allows citizens of Jackson to bring in their metals, cardboards, paper, and plastics. It will be open Tuesday through Saturday.
“This is a free drop-off site in the center of Jackson. This is where you’d bring all of your recycling materials. You would surrender those to us and then we would go through that process of getting them to the correct vendors so those can finish the recycling process,” said Robin Chance, the recycling coordinator.
“And this recycling center, I think the important thing about it is it will be manned. Cause what we see at our convenient centers now is people dumping trash, people cross-contaminating. And so having that person there to tell them, you know, the metal, cardboard, paper, plastic, I think is what we’re doing to look at the contamination piece and start that education,” Conger said.
The proposed greenway project includes a three mile asphalt trail that will go from the Bemis Museum to the West Main parking lot downtown.
After the trail is built, they will begin looking at more recreational items to add alongside the trail.
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