By Jeslyn Lemke
Gazette Reporter 

Unwanted trash clogging Palouse’s compost pile

 


Inappropriate materials thrown into the Palouse compost pile are back-logging the city’s time using the chipper to process the materials.

City staff has found big logs, bottles and root balls in the compost pile, matter which cannot be chewed up by the public chipper and which must be removed by hand.

The town council has heard details on the junk problem at several council meetings in the past few months from city Public Works Director Duane Griffin.

County Recycling and Waste Reduction Coordinator Judi Dunn-Grey spoke at the last council meeting and informed the council that abuse of a site that is not monitored is pretty common.

The city offers permits for $25 a year for citizens to leave materials at the site. There are currently 130 permits issued, according to Deputy Clerk Ann Thompson.

Thompson said she advises each person who visits city hall for a permit about the rules surrounding the use of the pile. In addition to the verbal message, people are given paperwork with those same rules and the site itself is marked with signs.

Palouse rents the county chipper and the Garfield chipper. The machines can only grind up certain yard waste - items like logs or metal can’t go through them.

Normally, it would take only a few hours for the city public works crew to process a collection of materials at the pile, Thompson told the Gazette. But the last round of processing on July 1 took the crew several extra hours- time which must be paid for the city to rent the chipper.

“Most of the time, it’s just carelessness. However, their carelessness still costs the city time and money,” Thompson said.

The site in Palouse has a video camera. Several times, city staff have watched days of tape to catch an illegal dumping. The city police have contacted offenders. Thompson said another issue is the site is being used by those who do not have permits.

Dunn-Gray said she believes a good solution could be gating and locking off the driveway to the pile, requiring people to come to city hall each time they need to enter the site.

Most other towns in the county aren’t seeing the same problems because their compost site is locked or they do not have a site for composting.

The town of Garfield’s compost site has almost the same features as that of Palouse; no monitoring and no gate. However, city clerk Annie Pillars said unlike Palouse, she has not heard of any issues with people dumping inappropriate debris at the town site.

Because the town’s site has been operating for a number of years, Pillars said she thinks citizens have simply come to be familiar with the given rules for using it.

“We have the advantage that it’s been operating for longer,” Pillars said.

Rosalia has its own city chipper, but no central chipping site. Instead, city crews visit homes if a resident needs to use the chipper.

 

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