Glasgow Spends $7.6M of Landfill Surplus Funds: Fund history and property purchase details

By Jeff Jobe, Community Publisher, Barren County Progress/JPI

Questions arise surrounding the $7.6M moved from the city-owned sanitation/landfill fund.  Questions the Barren County Progress will diligently research and report details as they are made available.

The Back Story:

On September 9, the Glasgow City Council approved in a majority vote to purchase 161.78 acres from MCS Properties, LLC following a closed session meeting citing KRS 61.810(1)(B).

Councilman Terry Bunnell made a motion, seconded by Councilman James Happy Neal, to buy the land at a purchase price of “$38,000 per acre”.

No discussion was had on the topic in open session and Council-members Marna Kirkpatrick and Max Marion opposed the purchase in the 7-2 vote.

On November 12, the council approved again with the same 7-2 vote to amend the current fiscal year’s budget to move a total of $7,600,000 from the Sanitation/Landfill Fund to the Capital Projects Fund with monies disbursed as follows:

$6,100,000 into the Admin. Purchase of Land Account; $800,000 into the Admin. Professional and Technical Account; and $700,000 into the Admin. Contractual Improvement Account.

A second reading of this ordinance was on November 25, with the same result of Kirkpatrick and Marion voting against moving surplus monies from the Sanitation/Landfill Fund for property they never supported buying in the first place.

Landfill Funds:

Over the last several years and multiple administrations of Glasgow leadership, there has been discussion of “required balances” or “mandated surpluses” to be kept on hand for possible emergencies and closing expenses associated with the city of Glasgow handling its own garbage burial and other surrounding communities.

The most recent request was from Kirkpatrick who questioned in open meeting City Treasurer Stephanie Garrett about these “required by law” funds to be kept.

Councilman Terry Bunnell and Garrett defended the moves saying there was money in the accounts but no balances were offered in the open meeting.

The BCP initially requested on November 13, 2024 copies of carryover balances from former administrations of Doty, Armstrong and Trautman and balances of the current administration of Royse.  The request was for both accounts often discussed and any requirements for those account balances.

Bunnell and Garrett both have made such statements in the past for not using these monies for other proposed projects including a waterpark and amphitheater.

Documents received from an open record request of city hall show the following fund balances associated with the referenced dates. However, as of press time we have yet to receive documents referenced with mandated account balances.

There are two accounts associated with the city’s landfill. One is identified in documents as the Sanitation/Landfill Fund and the other is referenced as the Closure/Post Closure Fund.

Over the years it has been explained in open meetings that the Sanitation/Landfill Fund is where operational expenses are processed with the operation of the landfill. While the Closure/Post Closure Fund is as the name would indicate; money set aside for when the time comes to close the landfill and maintain the property associated with buried garbage for years to come.

Account balances dating back to 2011-2012 show a beginning balance of $4,475,947.00 and $4,371,139 for the Mayor Rhonda Trautman administration.

The 2015-2016 beginning balances for Mayor Dick Doty shows $5,259,455 and $4,449,854. These balances indicate that the 4-year term of Trautman grew the accounts by $783,508 and $78,715, leaving Doty a combined balance of $862,223 more than she received.

This positive trend continued with Doty leaving Mayor Harold Armstrong with balances at the end of 2019-2020 reported to be $7,334,603 and $5,690,867; a growth of $2,075,148 and $1,241,013 combined being $3,316,161 more by Doty than when taking office.

An even stronger growth was passed along by Armstrong to Mayor Henry Royse for the dates of 2023-2024 with documents showing surplus balances of $10,470,621 and $6,208,822; a growth of $3,136,018 and $517,955 respectively. This is $3,653,973 more in the landfill accounts combined passed along by Armstrong than he received.

As of today, the Royse balances for these funds are cash balances for the Sanitation/Landfill of $3,134,064 and $6,463,372.  These amounts show this administration having less than $7,336,560 for the account identified as the sanitation/landfill fund while growing the closure account by $254,550.

These balances and trends show a shift in administration strategy and explained by Bunnell as, “We have saved and been frugal for a long time and it’s now time to use it to grow and improve our city.” Saying the city balance sheets wouldn’t be affected by land because they offset the cash paid for it.  This would certainly be accurate as long as the amounts paid for the land would keep up with their true value and offset the costs of the additional costs associated with the land development.

The $6,100,000 Land Purchase:

Mayor Henry Royse detailed in his public “Open House” meeting on December 3 that he was contacted by Brian Shirley in August about the possibility of buying property.

Ultimately on the same day, November 26, 2024, there were two property transfers.

At 11:03 a.m. property from the J. Leonard and Bernadine Johnson Living Trust was transferred to MCS Properties LLC for the sum of $5,871,960.

This transfer included a few sections of the property initially listed as two on the Real Estate Multiple Listing Service (MLS) as property 159.52 acres on Cleveland Avenue and 36.2 acres located on Scottsville Road. The Cleveland property includes the acreage, a 2136 +/- sq. ft. home, and 5 other structures for a listing price of $7,000,000 and a sold price listed on the listing site of Zillow updated as sold on 11-26-24 for $4,785,000.

The MLS also had a second Johnson Living Trust piece of property described as 36.21 acres on Scottsville Road for $1,600,000 and a sale price of $1,086,330.

The second closing on November 26, 2024, shows being filed at 3:42 p.m. This portion is the property described as the Cleveland Avenue property, for $6,061,798. It is the same description as the earlier closing minus the land descriptions of Scottsville Road.

MSC Properties LLC closed on this day both sections of land sold by the Johnson Living Estate for $5,871,960. Then four hours later sold the farm acres alone to the city of Glasgow for $6,061,798, a $189,838 increased price and retained the Scottsville Road 36.21 acres for themselves.

The language omitted from the Johnson Living Trust sale to the City of Glasgow was the land Royse indicated in the open meeting as property Brian Shirley wanted to keep and he did.

* The BCP has made a second request for any documents, or mandates associated with required balances for municipality-owned landfills and will report those when received.