Recycling summit slated at Rosalia

A “Coming Together for Recycling Summit,” has been scheduled Oct. 23 at 6:30 p.m. at the Rosalia Community Center, according to Judi Dunn-Gray, county recycling and waste reduction manager.

Dunn-Gray said rural towns of Whitman County are having difficulties with the frequency of collections and charges.

Dunn-Gray hopes to gather participants in every part of the loop at this first meeting, including haulers, schools, businesses, state solid waste planners and processors.

“This will be a wide-open brainstorming session focused on identifying critical paths to possible solutions,” Gray said. “We will make sure there is room for everyone.”

The summit is focusing on single stream improvements such as:

• Single stream recycling in Whitman County is in a crisis, particularly in the rural towns with no curbside collection. Rural communities face the added challenge of extensive transportation costs to get collected recyclables to distant recyclers for processing.

• Recycling goals are less attainable as local governments struggle to meet consumer demands and state targets in an environment of collapsing commodity markets.

• Waste haulers are expanding their recycling operations to include single and dual streams that increase the amount of recyclables, but don’t necessarily guarantee higher rates of actual recycling due to contamination.

• Schools in rural areas have tools to do education and collection with support from towns providing collection areas.

• Develop collaborative partnerships to address recycling.

Gray said she hopes to develop a set of problem statements that will serve as a task list for follow up, negotiation and development.