Serving Whitman County since 1877
Serving Whitman County since 1877
After discontinuing the local service for yard waste last January due to costs and misuse, the Palouse city council listened to a proposal for another way to go about it.
Whitman County Commissioner Greg Partch at the July 10 Palouse council meeting suggested that the county could drop off a collection container for yard debris. The collection box would be hauled back to the county’s landfill site.
Whitman County Solid Waste Manager David Nails, who was with Partch at the meeting, said it costs about $50 an hour to operate a traditional wood chipper program, and the drop-box service would be about half of that cost.
The county’s larger chipper is not as sensitive to errant nails and other obstructions as the smaller, portable chipper which Palouse used in its previous effort.
Whitman County Public Works Director Mark Storey said the county would like to make a test run of the drop box service.
Storey accompanied Partch and Nails to the Palouse council session.
The drop-boxes are 25 X 8 feet and eight feet deep.
Nails added another option for Palouse to buy a bin for $12,000.
“We could trade in our police car,” commented Councilman Tim Jones.
Nails said the yard waste collected in Palouse would be added to the 800 tons of it that Whitman County Solid Waste processes four times per year.
This waste is chipped in a large tub-grinder, contracted by Cannon Hill of Post Falls. Each quarter, Cannon Hill brings down their large chipper on a semi-trailer. They pay $20 a ton for the yard-waste material, which they chip and sell to places such as the Potlatch Corporation to use for “hog fuel” or energy for sawmills.
If the county brought a bin to Palouse, there would be a cost to the town, although Nails said he is not sure what that would be. He estimates it could be about half of the $50 an hour figure it cost to deliver a chipper to Palouse in the previous program.
Beyond the charge from the county, the town would need to provide aid in loading the box, such as with a back hoe to lift the yard waste into the bin.
Mayor Echanove asked a few questions of Nails and Storey, and said that Palouse Public Works Superintendent Dwayne Griffin will confer with Nails.
“That was very informative,” commented Echanove. “Thank you, gentlemen.”
Nails said later that the program would be available to any Whitman County town that would like to try it.
Garth Meyer is a former Whitman County Gazette reporter.
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