Bristol, Virginia makes progress in landfill debt

The Bristol, Virginia City Council held a public hearing regarding its landfill debt. A debt that, officials say, has held the city back for many years.

“This gives us a little bit of breathing room, where before we didn’t know which way to turn. We didn’t have funding, we had high debt, we weren’t sure what to do,” said city mayor Becky Nave.

Davenport and Company has been hired to assist with the city’s finances. They say reducing the debt from the landfill will help the city overall.

“Since 2017, you can see that slow and steady climb of them bringing us out of the debt and really helping us with that,” Nave said.

City Council voted unanimously to appropriate more than $30 million toward the debt. Nave says 26 million is from the state.

“We were thrilled when we were able to get state funding last year to help with that. That has been significant,” Nave said.

Another topic discussed, Believe in Bristol’s funding. Last year, the organization received $50,000, this year they requested an additional $20,000.

In a 4-1 vote, the council decided to allocate them $50,000 again. Councilman Anthony Farnum was the opposing vote.

The city council says the $20,000 will still be invested in the city.

“It’s still going to be put in our downtown, it’s still going to help our businesses,” Nave said. “But we just wanted to make sure we had some cushion there to make sure to do some tings we want to do in the city.”