The city of Selma is once again digging into the city coffers to help prevent a fine from the Alabama Department of Environmental Management.

During their meeting earlier this month, the city council gave Mayor George Evans permission to seek bids on work and materials needed to better maintain the now closed landfill on J.L. Chestnut Boulevard.

“Part of the agreement we had with ADEM when we closed the landfill is that we would maintain it for 30 years,” Evans said. “Part of that is ensuring we control erosion at the site and ensure that no gases leak out. This is part of that work.”

During the council meeting, members declined the request to appropriate funds to the work before the city sought bids.

According to a legal notice published in the Times-Journal, the city will open bids for materials and work will be opened Thursday at noon at city hall.

“We’ve been in touch with ADEM through this entire process and have been working with guidelines they have laid out to manage the landfill,” Evans said.

The council will decide on approval of the bids during their next meeting, scheduled for Tuesday, Jan. 10.

The advertisement for bids asked for pricing on 6,500 cubic yards of top soil, 800 cubic yards of structural fill, hydo-seeding, rip rap flume, 250 yards of unclassified excavation and “other associated items of work.”

The most recent dealings with ADEM on the part of the city came earlier this year when the department required the city to clean up what was declared a makeshift landfill on Landline Road behind the county Sportsplex.

Over the past few months, the city has been working to remove trash and debris from that site, disposing of it at a landfill in Uniontown.

Wednesday, Evans said the work is continuing to clean up that site, but rainy weather has slowed the work.

City officials had planned to only use the site for natural items such as tree limbs, bushes and leaves, but it quickly turned into something completely different when household garbage was found to have been included.

The city had planned to use the site temporarily until a new cell could be constructed at the city’s new landfill on Water Avenue.

Since ADEM nearly cited the city for the landfill, work on the new cell has moved forward and is scheduled to be completed in early 2012.