FRENCHVILLE – The Northern Aroostook Regional Incinerator Facility budget has been approved for 2001-2002 at $820,000, the same as it has been for the last three years.

The facility processes solid waste for Fort Kent, Madawaska, Frenchville and St. Agatha. Although known as an incinerator, the facility has not burned trash in a decade.

Most of the solid waste, except for what is recycled out of the waste stream, is disposed at a Canadian landfill, Cogerno at Green River, New Brunswick.

“The budget is mostly the same, although amounts in accounts change,” Philip Levesque, Frenchville town manager and the NARIF administrator, said Monday.

“The amounts each town will pay also changes a bit, but the total budget is the same.”

The budget was approved at a NARIF board of directors meeting last week.

Each member town will include its share in its municipal budget during budget negotiations in the coming months. The share each community pays is based on population and its state valuation. The largest community is Madawaska, and the smallest is St. Agatha.

Madawaska, Fort Kent and Frenchville started the solid-waste venture in the 1970s. St.Agatha joined the partnership about 10 years ago.

Beyond the $820,000 in the budget, the organization will spend $14,100 of its $47,000 reserve for two special projects during the coming year. That will leave the surplus at about $33,000.

The two special projects are the purchase of seven trash bins and the construction of a loading ramp at the facility.

The trash bins will be placed in the four towns for collection of cardboard. Separating the cardboard, which can be sold on the recycling market, will remove it from the waste stream.

The recycling of cardboard is expected to reduce the tonnage of solid waste disposed in Canada. Each ton of cardboard separated from the waste stream saves about $70 in disposal and transportation fees.

During the last year, NARIF transported 9,250 tons of solid waste for disposal at the Canadian landfill. The annual amount usually stays at about 9,500 tons, Levesque said.

Labor and benefits use about $137,200 of the budget. Those salaries are for a supervisor and three laborers, including all of their taxes and medical insurance.

The biggest part of the budget is for payment of disposal at the Canadian landfill. That amount is estimated at $418,000 in the upcoming budget year. Another $165,500 is estimated for the transportation of the refuse from the Frenchville plant to the disposal site, about 30 miles away.

The facility pays an annual land lease to the Northern Aroostook Regional Airport for the land where the recycling facility is located. The $29,260 lease is used by the airport for its annual expenditures.

Recycling expenses are estimated to be $33,500. On the other side of the recycling picture, NARIF expects to collect $49,400 for recyclables it sells.

Recyclables, totaling about 685 tons, include cardboard, newsprint, office paper and plastics.

Levesque estimated that NARIF will end its current budget year Jan. 31, with a surplus of $2,994.

For the coming budget year, according to Levesque’s figures, Madawaska, with a population of 4,803 and a valuation of $387,700,000, will pay the lion’s share of the budget at $448,540.

Fort Kent, with a population of 4,268 and a valuation of $119,850,000, will pay $119,850 for solid waste disposal. Frenchville, with a population of 1,338 and a valuation of $32,850,000, will pay $71,586, and St. Agatha, with a population of 919 and a valuation of $35,000,000, will pay $60,844 for disposal of its trash.