Waters True Value in Junction City is one step closer to gaining a special use permit to put in a propane fueling station.

The Junction City/Milford/Geary County Metropolitan Planning Commission has made its recommendation to the City Commission to approve the special use permit, despite staff’s recommendation of denial. Staff was recommending denial based on safety concerns and the tank being located in the central business district.

After hearing from both the staff and representatives from Waters True Value and Propane Central the MPC felt that there were enough safety precautions that would be in place.

“There was enough comments being made by professionals in there,” explained Maureen Gustafson, Chair of the MPC. “People who will be running it will be certified in what they are doing, and we didn’t feel like probably the risk was quite as high as it was presented, and that it would be a deterrent to the business that was there.”

Currently the Waters True Value in Junction City only offers a 20 gallon cylinder exchange. What they’re proposing to do is place a 500 gallon propane tank with fueling station behind their business along 5th Street that would let them fill bottles on site.

According to Scott Waters, who oversee’s all of the Waters True Value stores in the state, the fueling station would not only benefit themselves, it would also benefit the consumer.

“Right now we’re pretty limited to what we can do, and this allows us to do a lot more,” said Waters. “The other huge thing for the consumer is, when you’re getting ready to have a party and do a barbecue and you have maybe a quarter of a tank left, you have the option to go exchange it and just lose that quarter of tank that you have, or we can actually just fill on top of that. The neat thing about that is we charge for what we put in your tank, we don’t charge for a cylinder exchange.”

The recommendation will now go to the City Commission for final approval.