One of Ironton’s staunchest allies in the war on trash has been sidelined recently, but only temporarily.

If it seemed that the city’s street sweeper had not been as visible recently, there is good reason. The sweeper was placed into the shop for maintenance and also lost its operator.

“It was broken down for a few days, so a lot of what you’ve not seen recently was maintenance being performed on it,” Mayor John Elam said. “Then we had that position posted due to some job bumping.”

Elam said that the city has searched in-house for a replacement sweeper driver, but should soon begin advertising to fill the slot.

In the meantime, the mayor said that some city employees would be filling in, though on a reduced schedule. The streets should be cleaned on Sundays and a few times during the week.

The city began leasing the sweeper, priced at $121,000, in mid-January of 2005. The new sweeper was required to keep the city’s gutters as clean as possible to help keep with EPA standards concerning the amount of waste allowed to enter the water.

Although he had no firm timetable, Elam said he hoped to find someone to permanently fill the street sweeper’s driver seat soon.