District will help look for tire solution

Helping clean up tons of tires from along county roads may in the future for a local group tasked with promoting conservation and recycling.

Members of the Jay County Solid Waste District board agreed Monday to consider helping the county highway department with the cost and/or procedure of recycling the hundreds of tires it finds in side ditches around the county each year.

Ken Wellman, superintendent of the highway department, came to the waste district board asking for help in paying a company that periodically hauls away the tires.

But board members, wondering if there is a better or more cost effective solution, asked Kay Hayes, executive director of the waste district, to investigate and make a report next month.

Among the options discussed Monday was the purchase of a semi-trailer which would be used to store tires collected by the highway department and then to haul them to a recycling facility.

Although at one point the discussion touched on purchasing a slicer to quarter the tires for disposal in the Jay County Landfill, the board moved away from that option.

"If they can be processed (recycled) ... why just put it in the landfill?" board member Dan Orr asked rhetorically.

Board members Jim Zimmerman, Bill Gibson, Faron Parr and Milo Miller Jr. agreed with Orr's assessment.

Wellman, who said the amount of tires in side ditches has risen markedly over the past 12 months, gave the board copies of a recent bill from Elk Distributing Inc., Elkhart. The company charged $665 to haul away 378 tires.

Wellman, who due to the volume believes that some small service stations are responsible for at least some of the dumping, said those 378 tires were collected in the last three months.

"We're trying to figure out ... if there's somebody who can help us out. Our budget is getting tighter every year," Wellman said.

Also Monday, an official from the company that owns and operates the Jay County Landfill said that efforts are being made to stop a problem that has resulted in trash collecting along Ind. 67 near the landfill.

Barry Ledbetter, Waste Management Inc., said that a truck that dumps at the landfill does not completely empty. This results in trash blowing out and littering Ind. 67 as the truck leaves the site.

"We'll put a stop to that," Ledbetter promised. "It's costing us money to pick it up."

Ledbetter also said Monday that Waste Management is working hard to find business. Volume at the landfill was down once again in March, and that directly affects the waste district, which is funded almost entirely by a $1.25 per-ton district tipping fee collected by the landfill and paid to the district.

Income for March was $16,681, based on 13,479 tons of trash. That income was about $600 less than the $17,345.79 in claims approved Monday by the board.

The district retains significant reserves, including $65,541.33 in checking, and $102,234.97 in an investment account.

In other business, members of the board:

•Heard Hayes say she is watching collection totals at several Saturday drop-off locations around the county - especially sites in Redkey and Pennville that have two collection days per month.

"We're just keeping an eye on things," Hayes said.

Totals for the second collection of the month in Redkey and Pennville have fallen significantly. Letters were recently sent out to not-for-profit groups that staff the drop-off sites saying dates could be trimmed if volume falls far enough.

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