Earlier this month, the Lunenburg County Board of Supervisors tabled a proposal to put a convenience center on the east side of Oral Oaks Road, north of Red Level Lane, after a group of residents from the community turned out to complain that the center would attract animals, create smell and hurt property values.

Instead, board members ended up asking the residents to help find another location for the center in the vicinity.

And that was after the county spent 2 1/2 years looking for a location.

We sympathize with the residents, of course; and understand their argument. That said, we also understand the county’s situation.

As quickly as possible, the county is phasing out the “open top” sites — locations where open bins sit for anyone to throw away whatever.

Because these sites are unsupervised, items that should not be disposed of with household trash end up being thrown into them.

Consequently, when a fire starts in one of them, firefighters are cautious because they have no idea what is in the bin.

The county has whittled the number of these open-top sites down from 49 to 12.

The collection sites are in a fenced area that keeps animals out, and are manned so that someone monitors what is disposed of, and also makes sure that trash is picked up around them. There are also recycling bins at the locations.

Yeah, all those things are good, but we can imagine that’s little comfort if the site is your neighbor.

Trash is the burden of every locality and the byproduct of our existence. A few thousand-year-old trash items might excite archeologists, but, for those of us around with it today, it just — well, stinks. So we do need to deal with it.

County officials are also trying to make sure every resident in Lunenburg is within approximately five miles of a convenience site.

Right now, the county is also still looking for a site to establish a convenience center near Route 138 south of Brickland Road.

Expressions such as “necessary evil” get tossed around so much that they no longer really convey much weight.

We hope that a compromise is reached that satisfies the residents; but we also realize that some sacrifice is necessary.

These sites and are needed and necessary and they have to be — and are going to be — located somewhere.