There are less than four years until the use and support agreements between eight area localities and the Southeastern Public Service Authority expire, and that means it’s crunch time.

The trash authority’s members, which include Suffolk, on Wednesday approved the issuance of a request for proposals for waste disposal services in 2018 and into the future.

Board member Michael Johnson of Southampton County also reported that a committee has made good progress drafting new use and support agreements, which should be ready to present to the full board well ahead of the March deadline, he said.

The tight time frame includes receiving the proposals in December and reviewing them and negotiating an agreement by June 2015. At the same time, members will be approving their use and support agreements and executing them by August 2015.

By October 2015, an award should be confirmed for waste disposal services, according to the timeline.

The members approved using a competitive negotiation process for the waste disposal proposals rather than sealed bidding because “cost is not the primary consideration” and because the procurement is of a technical nature, making the solution “best left to the vendors to propose, rather than limit the available options,” according to the board’s resolution.

A new use and support agreement is likely to be less advantageous to Suffolk than its current one, which gives it free disposal of trash at the regional landfill in exchange for hosting the landfill.

In replacement, the city has requested a post-2018 fee of $4 per ton with a minimum payment of $1 million per year. The host fee is an average of the host fees paid throughout Virginia, according to a letter from City Manager Selena Cuffee-Glenn to the SPSA board members in July.

She also proposed that the host agreement address items such as a flyover from Route 58 eastbound to improve safe access to the landfill.