HOPES have been raised that Teesdale’s green waste and community composting service may not close.
Rotters Composting, a not-for-profit community project, had announced it would cease collecting garden waste from about 3,000 homes in the Teesdale area due to rising costs and the need for more funding.
Durham County Council was expected to take over the service, giving customers with green recycling bins instead of the green bags provided by Rotters.
But the county council now says Rotters is exploring further funding opportunities.
Town councillors have been in talks with Jill and Martin Bacon, who have run Rotters for 20 years, and have hopes of helping to save the service.
The situation was due to be discussed by Barnard Castle Town Council as we went to print on Monday night.
Mr Bacon said: “We announced we would stop due to a lack of funding from Durham County Council – they’ve wanted it to be run in-house for decades.
“Straight away after we made the annoucement, town councillors got in touch to say they wanted to keep it going.
The county council said: “We understand they are still exploring further funding opportunities. We have been closely working with them since 2004/5 originally as district councils then as county council since 2009. We have supported and encouraged this valuable service through payment of recycling credits, increasing these annually, in addition to the subscriptions customers paid to Rotters.
“We will monitor the position closely and explore contingency arrangements should their current service cease.”
Last week, Rotters said that although it was planning to cease green waste collection, it would continue to sell compost.
