RENSSELAERVILLE — As trash fees increase, the town of Rensselaerville will no longer be accepting large items at its transfer station.

At the town board meeting on Nov. 9, the town’s recycling coordinator, Jon Whitbeck, explained the tipping fees charged by the Albany City Landfill located on Rapp Road were going to increase from $52 to $62, but that the town was not informed about this before it created its 2018 budget — the town board adopted the preliminary budget as the adopted budget later that evening.

To mitigate these costs, the town will no longer take larger items in the coming year, said Whitbeck.

Councilwoman Marion Cooke asked Whitbeck what residents would do with their bulky waste. Whitbeck said to rent a Dumpster. He said those bringing in the waste aren’t often necessarily homeowners, but local carpenters depositing debris from a project because “it came from your town.”

Whitbeck said he hoped that this doesn’t lead to people dumping their large waste on the the side of the highway.

Rensselaerville Supervisor Valerie Lounsbury noted that, in the past, the town has not taken a lot of large items such as wood. Otherson the board remarked on the cost of dumping such bulky items at surrounding landfills or transfer stations: Councilman Gerald Wood said it cost him only $45 to drop off waste following a construction project at the Montgomery Otsego Schoharie Solid Waste Management Authority’s Schoharie County location in Cobleskill.

In the gallery, Steve Pfleging, who was elected last week as the next town supervisor and who owns a construction business, said it cost $150 to dump at Greene County’s transfer station.

Councilman John Dolce began saying, “I bet if people did a better job of recycling,” before Whitbeck cut him off, saying, “Hey, John, I can’t lead them by the hand.”