The Cookeville City Council has given the Public Works and Sanitation Division approval to spend almost $600,000 of next year’s sanitation budget for two new trucks.
City Manager James Mills said the city needs another front loading garbage truck and a roll off truck. Mills said the sanitation division wanted to get approval now so the trucks can be ordered immediately.
“These take many months to get in,” Mills said. “Other concerns are the impact of tariffs already impacted the price of these vehicles. We don’t know if that’s going to continue to go up, but we believe the prudent thing to do was to go ahead and order the vehicles, and the council did authorize that.”
Mills said the the city’s growth is forcing the department to add another residential route to its pick-up services.
“Once we are in our new budget we will be proposing an additional driver and with this new truck,” Mills said. “Once we have all on board and the driver trained, then we will sit down and decide how best to divvy up the city into five individual sections for residential pick-up.”
Mills said the funds for the two trucks will come from the sanitation fund. Mills said even though they are ordering the vehicles now they will be paid for out of the 2025/2026 budget.
“We heave a healthy fund balance there now,” Mills said. “And with the additional monies we’ve recently put in the last few years from the property tax, we’re in good financial shape there and it allows us to be able to keep our fleet up to date.”
