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Disposing of yard waste has become more and more costly for the city of Viroqua.

The city is considering some changes in its curbside brush pickup policies. The city currently picks brush and yard waste for free as long as bigger items are in four-foot bundles.

City street superintendent Steve Clark said city workers generally spend a good part of their Friday and sometimes part of Monday with several pieces of equipment gathering yard waste. Assistant city administrator Matt Giese said the city recently had a contractor with a large grinder chip a large stockpile of waste that cost the public works department about $12,000. The city made back some of that cost by selling some of the chips, but the net cost was around $9,000, said Giese.

Public works committee chairman Marc Polsean raised the question of charging for brush pickup given the increased cost to run equipment and chip the material.

"I think we need to be very careful about taking away services to our residents," said alderman Roger Hatlem. "We have eliminated so many other things, but to take away something else that taxpayers are paying for… I understand what you are saying and can see something for the bigger stuff. I am concerned about taking something else away."

Clark said it is city policy that homeowners have a contractor haul the waste away if they are hired to do tree trimming and yard work, but that policy is very hard to enforce.

"What happens is if you ask who did the work people say my brother or my son," said Clark. "So, it is very hard to enforce that policy."

Polsean asked that the public works staff consider coming up with a price for the collection of any debris that requires the use of heavy equipment. The committee will discuss the issue again at a later date with possible amounts to charge for the pickup.

In other business, the committee discussed the possibility of abandoning some city alleys that get little or no use. Polsean said he recently took notice of some alleys that are maintained by the city that lead to nowhere and have no possible future use. Polsean said some of those alleys are on the list to be improved during the upcoming construction season.

Clark said the public works department tries to make improvements to five or six alleys per year. The committee discussed a number particular situations and scenarios regarding alleys in various locations. In some instances, the alleys in question serve a couple of properties and in others they are quite long and only serve one property.

City attorney David Jenkins said legally the city has no obligation to maintain alleys. Jenkins said one of the ways an alley becomes public is when money is spent on it.

"Just because it is public doesn't mean you have to expend funds," said Jenkins. "Legally there is nothing that says you have to plow, etc. But that is not up to me to decide which ones get plowed, but legally you have no obligation to expend funds to maintain them. You do have to maintain streets in order to get state aid but not alleys."

Jenkins said there are some alleys in town now that are privately owned and maintained.

"Well, how about a notice in the paper then that says we will no longer maintain alleys?" asked Polsean.

The committee asked city administrators to put together a list of alleys that have questionable use. The council will review it at a later date.