Keep Bringing Out Your Dead in Maury County…For Now, Anyway

Talk about your bulk items.

Livestock carcasses will continue to be picked up in Maury County, at least for another six months, after the county Budget Committee voted earlier this week to extend a collection-and-disposal contract valued at $20,700 with the Appertain Corp. and the South Central Tennessee Development District, The (Columbia) Daily Herald reports.

The 5-1 vote came after debate over whether the program constitutes an unnecessary subsidy or rather a worthwhile public service that also happens to primarily benefit a key regional economic sector.

“When it comes down to using our tax dollars to subsidize a business expense, I don’t like that, because I don’t think that’s how tax dollars should be spent,” said Commissioner June Beckum.

Mayor Jim Bailey countered that Maury County is one of the top cattle-producing counties in Tennessee,  and local ranchers “produce several millions of dollars worth of income for us and a tremendous property tax base for us.”

According to the paper, the county allocated another $1,000 “to fund a study to come up with a long-term solution,” but the University of Tennessee Agricultural Extension Service has yet to complete it.