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Two city-owned maintenance yards used to be heated with increasingly expensive natural gas, used what would otherwise be waste.

Mechanics replace the oil on police and other city vehicles every 4,000 miles. The stuff used to get shipped out of state for disposal at a cost of about $3,000 per year, said Gene Bustamante, an analyst for the city Department of Municipal Development. Now, that oil goes into 13 special heaters that keep the yard buildings warm all winter.

The heaters cost about $9,000 each, but Bustamante said the cost savings are expected to recoup the purchase price in just as few as two years. City statute requires that sort of quick payback for such conservation expenditures, he said.

And once the heaters are paid off, everything beyond that is pure savings to taxpayers. That's just the sort of energy conservation that City Councilor Isaac Benton says he wants to see more of.

On Monday, the council is slated to vote on a bill he sponsored that would increase spending on similar projects.

Every year, the city spends tens of millions of dollars renovating buildings, constructing new ones or maintaining roads - activities that are lumped into a category called "capital improvement."

Benton's bill would set aside 1 percent of those capital improvement funds and put it toward alternative energy initiatives.

That money, about $1.25 million per year by Benton's calculations, would be in addition to the 1 percent that already pays for traditional energy conservation measures as those heaters.

Benton said he might even try to boost the alternative energy figure by another percentage point, bringing the total renewable energy tally to $2.5 million in additional funding.

Besides the environmental benefits of the projects, "I am confident that they will pay for themselves," Benton said.

Also up for a vote Monday:

Kendra's Law, which would enable courts to force mentally ill patients into treatment programs in some limited circumstances. The controversial measure pits concerns about civil liberties and inadequate mental health services against public safety worries.

Ethics reform, a holdover from the last meeting. The measure, sponsored by Councilors Sally Mayer and Brad Winter, would overhaul campaign disclosure and conflict-of-interest rules.