PARIS – A local tire company has asked the Norway-Paris Solid Waste board for a discounted disposal fee, if other businesses get one.

“I wanted to be treated the same way,” Bob Jewell II of Jewell Tire Center in Paris said Friday.

The board recently voted to increase fees for commercial haulers from $7 an item to $25 when the items did not come originally from Norway or Paris. That action, which has yet to take effect, prompted Norway businessman Chris Shorey of Main Street Furniture and Appliance to say he was being treated unfairly because the business has been recategorized as a commercial hauler, subject to the higher fees.

After reading newspaper articles about the issue, Jewell wrote the NPSW board saying everyone should be treated equally.

Jewell’s letter was released Friday after a 7-1 telephone vote of the eight-member board. Board chairman Ray Garnett said he would not release the name of the board member who voted against the letter’s release on the advice of board attorney Dana Hanley of Paris. The telephone vote was also taken with consent from Hanley, Garnett said.

In the letter, Jewell wrote, “…Years ago we used to dispose of our tires through NPSW, hauling them directly to the facility in Auburn where the tires were burned, with NPSW picking up the tipping fees. At some point in time, years ago, we were asked to find another avenue to dispose of our tires; since then we have been paying 100 percent of the fee to dispose of our junk tires.”

NPSW does not see any tires that are generated directly from Jewell because everything his business generates is disposed of by an outside vendor, who is registered with the DEP, at a cost paid 100 percent by Jewell.

“As I read the newspaper articles,” Jewell wrote, “I ponder, should I ask NPSW for special pricing, since NPSW disposes of tires at its facility, a facility that Jewell Tire Center Inc. pays taxes to support?

“My point in all of this is,” Jewell wrote, “if you give special treatment to the furniture business in question; then I sincerely believe, in all fairness, that Jewell Tire Center Inc. should be able, as well, to dispose of our trash at a discounted fee. Please consider my request as you decide the outcome of the local furniture store. I certainly am not willing to see my business’s taxes increase, therefore subsidizing another business, without me enjoying the same treatment!”

Garnett said he will bring the issue to the board at its Oct. 20 meeting.

On Thursday night, on the recommendation of Town Manager David Holt, selectmen declined to hear again from parties concerned about the growing controversy.

In an undated memo to the board, Holt said it was the Norway-Paris Solid Waste board’s decision to make, but that selectboards from Norway and Paris could meet with the NPSW board if necessary or desired for discussion purposes. Only the NPSW board can set fees, he said.