the Board of Directors of the Waste Reduction District of Monroe County for Thursday, April 9th, 2026.
Mr. McClassam, will you please call the roll? Piedmont Smith. Oh, I'm sorry. I did not recognize Piedmont
Smith there. I thought you said Pete somebody. Yeah, it said Pete there. But anyway, I'm sorry.
I am here. Thomas? Here.
Wilkes? Here. Jones? Ellis? Here. Thompson? Madera? Here. Have a quorum present in the room and Commissioner
Thomas online. All right, thank you. And welcome to our new board member, William Ellis, who we had
online at our last meeting, but first time in person, so welcome aboard.
All right, we'll start today with the executive committee meeting minutes. This is just for your information.
Did anybody want to raise anything in particular about those minutes? All right, then we can move on
to approval of the board of director meeting minutes for March 12th. Do I have a motion? I have to approve.
Second. All right, and Mr. McGlasson,
there was a small revision that I asked for today. Yes. Excuse me. On page three of the minutes under
the twenty twenty six community grant program. The first are the typographical correction of a little
flip flop on the date there it is twenty twenty six not twenty sixty two.
First paragraph under A, the 2026 Community Grant Program Award statement was added that the application
is from the IU Health Community Health Hygiene Pantry to purchase sustainable feminine hygiene products
for distribution to its clients. Thank you. Yeah, I thought it was important just to say what the grant
was. Any other discussion of the meeting minutes from March 12th? Seeing none.
Let's have a roll call vote. We'll have to do all our votes this way since we do have a member who is
on Teams. Thomas? Yes. Ellis? Yes. Piedmont Smith? Yes. Padera? Yes. Wills? Yes. Motion passes unanimously.
Thank you. All right, next we'll move on to the controllers report.
We have our controller, Theresa Goins, on Teams. Yes, I see her. All right, take it away. The cash flow
summary was sent in an email on Wednesday, April 8, 2026. See page one. Here are the balances as of
March 31st for the following accounts. Operating $4,634,526.31.
Debt service, $101.46. Capital, $46,188.18. Landfill post closure, $828,216.89. The individual cash
flow statements are on pages two through seven. Are there any questions on the accounts balances?
All right, any questions on that report?
Seeing none, we can move on to our claims. On page 12 of the packet, you have a summary of the pre-approved
payroll and claims since our last meeting in the amount of $139,535.26. The backup for those numbers
are on pages 13 through 48.
The payroll and claims for approval this week were sent in the email on Wednesday and are in the amount
of $67,612.76. Documentation was included in the Wednesday email. That brings the total of payroll and
claims that were recommending for approval to $207,148.02. Are there any questions regarding these claims?
All right, any questions?
I don't see any. Let's go to the public. Are there any public comments regarding payroll and claims?
No public here in person, and I don't see any hands raised. So we can move on to a roll call vote, please,
on payroll and claims. Oh, we need a motion. You don't have a motion on the paper. I'm terribly sorry.
Move approval as presented. Second. All right. Now we have a motion.
and a second so we can go ahead with our roll call vote. Ellis? Yes. Madera? Yes. Thomas? Yes. Wilts?
Yes. Tiedemann-Smith? Yes. Motion passes unanimously. Right. Thank you, Comptroller Goins. Next, we
have a report from Romkey about their plastics recycling in the Hefty Renew program.
Yes, we have Derek Carpenter on teams if he could be promoted so he can present to the board, please.
Hello everyone. Hi, could you activate your video please if you don't mind unless you're in the car
or something? Just got back.
from Cincinnati actually at our facility up there. Ask me a couple questions about the plastics recycling
that we receive from the waste reduction district and just wanted me to talk a little bit about it.
So. If you're not familiar with the process, what we are collecting from and picking up from your different
stations we take to our facility.
on production drive, it is then transported from there to our facility in Cincinnati. Cincinnati has
optical sorters, humans, robots, eddy currents to sort those different items, specifically PET bottles,
so that'd be water or soft drink, most likely, milk jugs, so it's HDPE natural, or
more detergent bottles and items like that. There's also an HTTP natural, which is your number two.
And then lastly, polypropylene, which is going to be more like yogurt, butter tubs, sour cream, items
like those. All of those are accepted within this program and sorted. And once we get enough, we end
up bailing those. Those end up going to end users.
I have a couple that I did share with Tom. Didn't know if that is what more information you wanted on
that. Just a couple a couple notes on in 2025 that Cincinnati facility had an 85 percent recovery rate.
So that includes every ton that we received. You know that's not specific to the waste reduction district.
About 8 to 10 percent of that is going to be
material we didn't want anyway. So we have your recovery rate somewhere between 93 and 95% for materials
that are going to Cincinnati. Some of the end users that we utilize is KW Plastics. They would take
the milk jugs, the yogurt tubs, and then Tab Packaging is another partner that we have that would take
the PET bottles. And we also work with
For items that would be more like an other or for some reason didn't get sorted correctly, we'd go to
Eastman, which is doing kind of like a reverse engineering, if you will, of plastics. It's called paralysis.
And so they're actually taking it back to oil, believe it or not. What questions do you have on the
program itself? And is there anything that I could
potentially answer. Oh, I'm sorry. Actually, before we get to that, I know you all want to talk about
the hefty renew program. The hefty renew program is currently being piloted in our Cincinnati location,
so it is a partnership with us and hefty that we can. I believe it's five counties within with within
Cincinnati and northern Kentucky that it can take styrofoam
Let's say like dinner, silverware, right? Like one use silverware. I guess it wouldn't be silverware,
it'd be plasticware, right? Shrink wrap, chip bags, right? Items that are very hard to recycle. We are
currently doing that with them. There's an orange bag that residents,
put into their trash can along with their single stream. So it'll go in their single stream in the orange
bag. And honestly, all we are doing is hand pulling it out when we get those bags. The bags are sold
at grocery stores and I believe some hardware stores as well. So the Kroger's, Meyers of the world,
the Lowe's, the Home Depot's of the world. That is currently what is happening.
We've had a few folks similar to you all asking for it to be expanded. Where we struggle with expansion
is we're not the only recycler, we're not the only processor in Bloomington and surrounding areas. In
that Cincinnati market, there really aren't, there isn't anyone else who is taking this material similar
to we are. So we're, us and Hefty have both
It's been slow, if you will, or hesitant to expand it because we don't want the other folks in the industry
getting these orange bags, a resident doing what they think is correct, and then it ends up in the landfill.
So I'm saying all that to say that our competitors are going to receive these orange bags if it would
be expanded to your county.
specifically to residential. If there's a way that maybe we could try to do it potentially at like your
drop sites, that might be a conversation that we could have. I would need to get that approved from
my end, but I don't think that we'd be able to have it go to residents. Sorry, I'm getting a phone call.
All right, thank you so much, Mr. Carpenter.
Um, are there questions, um, about the plastic recycling or, um, specifically the hefty renew program
commissioner Thomas? Yes, I've been, um, an advocate for adopting this program and I think it would
only work if it, if it came out of our drop sites, um, our rural transfer sites. So I think that would
work. Um, and.
I also have a question about sort of the grocery store style bags as well being accepted. Yeah, sorry,
I tried to decline a phone call and it accepted it. I don't know if you all can see me or not. I've
got a blank screen actually. Can you hear me at least?
Yes, we can see you and hear you. Thank you. I can't see you. All good. The grocery bags, not something
that's acceptable within our program. It could go into a hefty bag, but it was a tangler for some of
our machines, how they currently are set up.
And that was my question was whether the hefty program accepted those as well. We do have a few grocery
stores that take them here. But I know that a lot of them end up in the landfill, unfortunately. So
I would appreciate it if we could move forward with having some conversations about using our drop sites
to collect this. And I don't think it's confusing with our trash program, which is also an orange bag,
but it has very different lettering on it. So I could see that we could get around that and we can make
this work. So I'd be very, very happy to see this moving forward in terms of conversation with Rumpke
and then with our district. Thank you.
Are there other questions for Mr. Carpenter? Yes, Councillor Wells. Does the HEFTA program take the
soft? Yeah, I wasn't clear on that either. What was the question? I'm sorry.
cutting out a little bit. Does the hefty program accept the grocery store plastic bags? It would.
It would. Okay, great, that's awesome. Shrink wrap, if you would happen to get some of that at home,
it would be Ziplocs. Yeah. Yeah, so it does take flexible. Okay, soft plastics, that's great.
So Commissioner Thomas indicated support for kind of moving forward with conversations around this program.
Is that something that you are able to facilitate? So I'll take this back to my manager and talk about,
having it only being a drop site. If it's only a drop site, I think that we can make that work. We were
mostly worried about it going to residents and ended up at other folks. So I think that it's something
that I could at least get piloted at worst case. Okay. Yeah, I think it'd be great to explore a drop
off system.
It is a little confusing that the hefty renew bags are orange and our bags are also orange, but we'd
have to be very careful in our messaging. I have a question about the end use or reuse of the bailed
plastics from your Cincinnati locations that you mentioned. A couple of companies that
purchased that plastic from Rumpke. You mentioned one of them reverse engineers the plastic back to
oil. How do they do that and what's the environmental footprint of that? I wish I was an engineer to
really help you with that. Be honest with you, I don't know all the way. The company's name is Eastman Chemical.
I'm not as in the weeds on that is if you show me a bottle or a different type of plastic and probably
tell you what it is, but I wish I had a little bit more information on that and I can follow up with.
And is there ever a situation where? Bromkey stores the bailed plastic and nobody buys it and then it
ends up going into a landfill.
pretty lucky that we have long term. We've also been super conservative so we have long term contracts
with folks on on material not only plastics but fiber paper glass and we know that we can't go backwards
if we say yes to a material. So no is the shorter answer to that.
You know, we get material, like I said, towards the beginning, we do get material that we cannot recycle
and that does go to the landfill. But as far as like pop bottles, yogurt tubs, and you know, milk jugs,
like those are getting. All right, that's great to know. Any other questions for Mr. Carpenter? Yes,
Councillor Williams.
Going back to what you said in the beginning about the recovery rate, and I understand you said it was
like 85%, but that includes stuff you didn't want. I'm assuming that's the non-recyclable items that
make their way into the stream. So then from the 93% recovery rate,
the 7% is just contaminated, not clean enough. What is the 7% that's rejected? That's correct. Yeah,
a lot of it is contaminated. It ended up in the wrong spot. Some of that we are trying to resort. So
we have a kind of like a rejections line, if you will, that'll put it back into the pile. I will tell
you that that's ability is getting an upgrade in 2027.
Our Columbus facility is, even with all of the material that we get, our recovery rate is closer to
like 95%, period. Wow. And Cincinnati is going to be getting an upgrade to be very similar to Columbus
in 2027. So that's positive statements for the future. Yeah. That material.
This has been really, really interesting. Thank you so much, Mr. Carpenter, for joining us. Any other
questions? Right. And we'll try to follow up about possibly doing the HEFTE program as a drop-off. Mr.
McClasson, anything else? I'll work with Tom and Joey on some logistics on that, and also with more
of the personnel as well.
All right, sounds good. All right, well then we can move on to our next agenda item, which is resolution
202602. Can we get a motion on the table, please? I move that we review and accept the resolution 202602
to amend the waste reduction district of Monroe County bylaws.
second. All right we have a motion and a second. Mr. McClassen could you please tell us about
this resolution? Yeah so interestingly enough when Mr. Ellis was appointed to our board and was getting
him materials I thought that he needed to prepare to be in this position it
Looking at the bylaws that I was sending to him, I realized they had not been updated since we had done
our name change, since the state enacted laws allowing and governing electronic participation at meetings.
But we needed to make those updates. You can see in the memo on page 50 of the packet in addition to that.
There's also some minor language changes in an attempt to clarify how meetings are noticed, that it's
in accordance with the open door law, the payment of claims under the resolution 2022 that allows for
claims to be paid without prior board approval, and CAC appointments and reappointment.
So you have with the resolution, you have a clean copy of the revised bylaws and behind that, a red
line version showing the changes that were made. All right, thank you. Good to get caught up with our
bylaws to reflect how we do things and what we're called. Are there any questions from commissioners?
I mean, board members?
I just want to highlight a couple things. In Mr. McGlass' memo he does say the board may convene provided
no official action is taken. In my experience almost any action we take would be receiving information.
So I don't really think we can meet without a quorum. I added because it has been a question in the
past where we've had members have to leave before
meeting adjourned and whether or not we could continue the meeting. We can as long as we don't talk
to each other or hear anything. Yeah I think it's uh it would be safer to to say that we could not meet
at all um for all practical purposes. I'm reading that I was trying to think what what I mean yeah what
would there be left to do
I guess we could go out for a drink or something. The other thing that caught my eye when reading through
the bylaws is that the appointment, let me find, in section 3.3, members of the board, paragraph A,
the term of directors who are elected officials and appointed to the board from the membership of an
executive legislative or fiscal body
have terms coextensive with the director's term of office on that body. So this is not how
we've traditionally had the appointments from the county council, which have been made separately every
year. And actually, until a few years ago, the city council also was making them every year until we
discovered that we weren't supposed to.
Maybe that's something, Councillor Welch, you can. I will make note. But that would also be for years.
We do it yearly. So if I could clarify, because I raised, with regard to the county council appointment,
I have raised that issue with the council office and their attorney is looking at it. However, I would
note for the record that what's in our bylaws is the statute verbatim.
So that is what it is. So but but what that section also is the statute requires the county council
to appoint somebody to our board. And in Mr. Ellis's case, the seventh member of our board is appointed
by the commissioners from
um the executive or legislative body of the municipality not having the largest population in the county
And the statute does specify that that is a two-year term Even though it's an elected position Even
though mr. Ellis's position is elected but in our case, you know That could be from either the ellisville
town town board or the steinsville town board
There are two municipalities not having the largest population in the county. Historically, we have
always had a representative of Ellsville on our board, and that's worked out fine. But the way that
the statute is written, that seventh position is identified separately and specified to have a two-year
term. Right, and it's not appointed by the town board of Ellsville.
It's appointed by the county commissioners, right? The way it was explained to me is referred to county
commissioners and they're the ones that actually make the efficient. Right. And I think historically
the commissioners have allowed the town board to select who they want to be appointed in the commission.
All right. I will say, I'm sorry.
my term next year December 31st so I'm on a different cycle so depending on that election I mean we
can get back on that cycle. Right and that's if you know depending on the outcome of the election we
would address that if we need to at that. Well that would match the cycle wouldn't it you said it was
a two-year term for service on this. Right that would be like a year
Your term will end on our board will end December 31st of 27. Which should coincide with your current
term in office. All right, any other questions or comments about Resolution 202602 to amend the bylaws?
to the public. Is there any member of the public who would like to comment on resolution twenty twenty
six oh two? None. I think we're ready for a roll call vote. Mr. McClassen. I just for the before the
vote would note for the record that the current and revised bylaws to amend the bylaws both require
a two thirds majority or five affirmative votes for this to pass.
I mean, everybody. Yes, so it needs to be a unanimous vote today. I can do math. Ellis? Yes. Madeira?
Yes. Thomas? Yes. Wilkes? Yes. Piedmont-Smith? Yes. Motion passes unanimously. All right. Thank you,
Mr. McGlasson, for bringing that
us and that this is our bylaws uh we'll move on to resolution 20 2603 um do we have a motion this is
the resolution to amend the district approved vendor list uh i move that we review and uh
resolution twenty twenty six oh three to amend. Strict approved vendor. It- commissioner Madero seconded
so we have motion a second. Mr glass and could you take us through this this is becoming very familiar
here. We keep on revising it. Would refer you to the memo on page seventy three the packet- and-
This is something that we do need to update from time to time. Yes, it does seem like it's happening
more frequently of late, but we have had some name changes of current vendors, some new vendors that
we're using. But I think in this revision, this request, the big one is adding Amazon Capital Services
to our vendor list.
As indicated in the footnote on the memo, our Amazon business account allows us to be invoiced for purchase
if we so choose. We have some things like Sharps containers that we will buy in bulk off Amazon. Currently,
that is the best price that we have found for those. And rather than
putting a significant expense on the credit card. We would prefer to be invoiced for that. And then
the other issue that came up with the recent grant award, where in the terms of the grant, we request
that the district purchase the materials, if the grant request is for the purchase of any supplies or
materials,
that we make those purchases directly. And again, Amazon was the vendor identified by the grant recipient
where they would like to purchase those products. And that was a $3,000 grant award. So we again didn't
want to put the significant expense on the credit card. Also think that for the purposes of grants,
It's a cleaner process if we're doing that and having a separate invoice for that purchase rather than
on a credit card bill with multiple other purchases included in that. So that's the reasoning for asking
for Amazon Capital Services to be on there, you know, with the understanding that, you know, we're not
going to invoice every 20, $50, $100 purchase that we do through Amazon. It would be larger expenses or
expenses specific to grant awards. All right, thank you for that explanation. Then we have a few name
changes and catching up with getting back the green up network on our list and things like that. Some
new vendors or some, I guess, not necessarily new vendors, but new to get added to the list as we counter
gotten to the point where we're regular transactions with. Right, any questions for Mr. McClassen on
this resolution? Comments? Directors? Is there any member of the public who would like to speak on resolution
2026-03? Right, seeing none, I think we're ready for roll call vote. Thomas?
Yes. Wilkes. Yes. Edmonton-Smith. Yes. Ellis. Yes. Vera. Yes. Motion passes unanimously. Right, thank
you very much. Moving right along, we have resolution 2026-04, Monroe County landfill financial assurance.
We have a motion. Yes, move to approve
Resolution 2020604, which is the waste reduction district Monroe County landfill financial assurance.
All right, it's been moved and seconded by Commissioner Madeira. Mr. McClassen, you want to take us
through this annual exercise, please? Certainly, and I'll get a little more detail for Mr. Ellis's benefit on this.
The state does require owners of landfills, both open and closed, to annually make a demonstration that
the financial resources are available to complete the necessary closure and post-closure work of that facility.
We annually, there's a formula that's in the Indiana Administrative Code that's used to estimate the
remaining, for our purposes, post-closure cost for that facility. Our engineering firm calculates that
for us and provides us that dollar figure, that estimate that we need to make the demonstration on.
There are seven mechanisms in the law that you can make this demonstration, purchasing bonds, insurance
policies. But one of them as a government entity that is available to us is a local government financial
test option. However, the district, based on the post-closure cost estimate remaining,
We don't meet the revenue threshold to qualify for that But Monroe County does and for the past nine
to ten years the county has graciously made that demonstration on our behalf So what this resolution
in essence does is approve staff Taking that request to the County Council again this year to make that
demonstration on our behalf
Thank you. Are there any questions from directors? That's our boats. This. There's there too. You sites.
Listed right. Correct and why. What's the difference once construction what is the construction demolition
landfill which is as much smaller.
But that is under a separate permit number from our municipal solid waste landfill. So we do a combined
total estimate, but for the purposes of submitting everything to the state, we have to separate those
two permits. But they're at the same location generally? Yeah. Got it. Thank you. All right. Any other
questions?
from the directors. Seeing none, we'll go to the public. Is there any member of the public who would
like to comment on resolution 202604? Right, seeing none, I think we're ready for a roll call vote.
Wilkes? Yes. Thomas? Yes. Piedmont-Smith? Yes. Ellis? Yes.
Yes. Motion passes unanimously. Right. Thank you so much. And we'll move on to department reports starting
with. I just would note because it's absent on the agenda this time. The CAC did not meet in March and
not have anything they felt the need to provide a.
So briefly, the legislation session is over. That helps. That makes this report much more brief. So
as discussed and approved at the last meeting, we did reopen the community grant program for a second
round of applications. Set a due date for those of 4 PM on Friday, May the 15th with
plan to be that the CAC would review those at their May 21st meeting and bring the applications and
the CAC recommendations to the board at their June meeting. To date, we have not received any applications,
but we have had inquiries and there has been interest expressed in that program. We do anticipate that
we will get some applications on the second go around for that.
Rainbarrel and compost bin ordering is a website is still there and available. I would note we did at
some point yesterday we had a technical issue and it did go down. We had we got a couple of calls about
that but it was back up and operating before I left the office to come up here this afternoon. So that
is back up and running. I think April 15th I believe is the ordering deadline and we.
have orders in and ready available for pickup beginning April the 24th. And then I think the last thing
that I would just like to know because we've had some discussions about the new website accessibility
requirements and have reviewed the new accessible rich internet application area requirements and the
ADA website and their
you know, fact sheets and so forth about those requirements and the implementation of those. And our
legal counsel has opined that there is a separate designation in the ADA rules and definitions regarding
that of a special district government that our attorney believes that
based on how the state defines us, how the ADA defines a special district government that we qualify
as that. And that is important because special district government's compliance date is not until April
27 of 2027. So we have another year. That said, as we've discussed, we had already begun the process
of reviewing our website and making revisions and updates and working toward the compliance
And maybe with a little less sense of urgency, but we're going to continue to work on that and try to
meet those requirements sooner rather than later and not have to worry about that deadline. With that,
I would be happy to answer any questions. All right. Thank you. Are there any questions about the report
we just heard?
You didn't say this out loud, but in your report, you noted that, I think it was social media, had promoted
Bee City USA for Bloomington. And I was wondering if you knew of anything about the program, frankly.
I apologize, I do not. Okay, don't worry about it. Oh, you do? Oh, cool. Yes. Yeah, so Bee City USA
is something that was brought to us by the City's Environmental Commission last year and the City Council
approved a resolution to have the city become an official Bee City. And it is spearheaded by Joanna
Sparks in our Parks and Recreation Department. And they have
of a steering committee made up of parks and rec, environmental commission members. I think they were
trying to get somebody from IU and from the county as well. So I don't know exactly who is on that steering
committee, but it exists. I'd be happy to give you the email of Joanna if you want to. I'll look her
up. That's great. Thank you. You're welcome. Any other questions on the administration report?
I think we can move on to Joey Long and recycling, reuse, hazardous materials, et cetera. Mr. Long.
Hi, everyone. I will start with the recycling and reuse. Our materials for the art supervisor was on
a short-term leave. I met with a lot of customers while she was gone and talked to them about stuff.
And there's a lot of appreciation for what she does. And I just happened to notice her hire-in date
and we're a little early,
We're coming up on 36 years of service for Mary Hunter. So we want to say thank you and she has made
a lot of friends and customers out there. So, you know, we want to acknowledge that and I've been letting
people talking to a lot of people about what she does. So that's really nice. The hazardous materials,
the staff will be meeting with the city department hand. We will be doing a training on safety and what
to expect.
We look forward to every year to helping the hand department to do two neighborhood cleanups. We assist
them with what they take and we make sure it gets sent out the proper way. So that's coming up real
soon. I will know shortly on what two neighborhoods they will do and I will put that out there. The
rural recycling centers, we,
I acknowledge there is some gravel work and some potholes starting to show up after the rains and stuff
again. So we do have plans to work with that. I've met with our contractor and we have some ideas on
again, how to keep fixing those and slowing those downs. Other than that, everything's been operating
as normal. If you guys have any questions, I'll do my best to answer them. Thank you very much, Mr.
Long. Any questions on that report?
I'll just chime in and say, Bryan Park neighborhood, which is in my district here in the city, recently
did a survey of what the neighborhood wanted to work on together and the number one response
was a neighborhood cleanup. So those are really popular and I really appreciate the district teaming
up with HAND to do those. I will actually be meeting with HAND tomorrow. I have a meeting with them
and I will give that to them.
Yes, that's great. Yeah, I don't know if Brian Park is going to be chosen this year. I think they recently
had one. So yeah, I only do it once every two or three years. Yeah. All right. If there are no other
comments on that report, we can move along to landfill and environmental compliance. Oh, and I do want
to recognize Mary Hunter. She has been an institution at the
South Wallet Street Recycling Center and a great steward of our Material for the Arts program. Now we
can move on to Lee Paulson and Landfill report. Good afternoon, Lee Paulson, Landfill Environmental
Compliance Director. The report pretty much speaks for itself. I noted in there that we had a
We had a what they call a soft violation with our NPDs with the treatment plant. Our total suspended
solids exceeded our monthly average just barely. This is the first exceedance we've had in probably
four or five years of any type. So it's not really, it's not a big deal, but it's a deal.
So we made appropriate adjustments with our treatment system and so far since then, we have been in
compliance with that. And other than that, got through the harsh winter and we're trying to get back
out there and get ready to get back on some roads and getting ready for our May groundwater sampling
event. It's not in the report because I just received the verification from ITEM
that we continue to do what we've been doing, how we've been doing it. Our numbers within our data are
all fairly consistent depending upon which sampling event it is, whether it's the winter or the summer.
Marybeth and I are working on that. This year is we're not planting any trees because we filled up the
areas that we had trees or area that we could plant.
Marybeth and I are working on trying to tackle some invasive species out at the landfill and the surrounding
areas. So we're hoping to do that here and there over the next couple of weeks before we get in the
groundwater. So we'll see how that goes. But if you guys have any questions, I'll be happy to answer.
All right. Thank you for that report. Are there any questions for Mr. Paulson? I just have one on the
total cases for 2026.
that's 48 total cases. But then 15 private properties and 36 roadside cleanups. Is that 48? Are those
included in the 48? Is that 48 in addition? Because that's 48 total for the year so far. So that's through
three months. That's a little lower than what we normally are. But considering January and February,
we're not very conducive to be outside and people doing stuff.
and it's it's not a number of concerned about concerned about but that's why we're hoping that now that
the weather is a little better that we can be out and try to tackle some more roads. That does add up
to. But you want 51 and not 48. That's all I'm saying is. Okay, I might have just mad about matter of my bad.
Okay, I just didn't know if those were separate from the 48, but they're not. So, yeah, sorry about
that. All right. I do have a question. The gallons generated, gallons of leachate was really high in
March. There were 572,000 gallons hauled.
We saw that we approved a large claim for that hauling as well. Can you just explain, I always get confused.
So if we have a lot of rain, is that more leachate, less? That's definitely more. The more rain, the
more leachate. That's just kind of how that goes. March was kind of an interesting time because we had
such a cold winter and it sustained for a while. So the groundwater froze.
And as it slowly thawed out, that released that water as well. So on and being there's no ground cover,
there's no grass really to absorb, you know, start to use that water up to help it grow because it was
so cold. So we captured all of it, you know, and it was a fairly wet March. So it went from dry to wet.
and we just had a lot all at once and trying to address it as best we can and that was after we had
gotten the valve fixed so it was just there was a lot of a lot of moving parts all at the same time.
Okay yeah I didn't think about the the thawing that contributes to that. If I could add a couple of
things to that too that uh you know our some time ago you know we when we were looking at
the relationship between rainfall and leachate generation. Our engineer, we have the outdoor above ground
retention pond that all the leachate gets pumped into and then either pumped to the treatment plant
or hauled out of. Well, both area of that, he estimated that one inch of rain will result in 13,000
gallons of just rain falling into that pond. And the other thing that you also have, you know,
How about February, but definitely March and a little bit in April? You know, as we come out of winter
and the vegetation is still dormant, we don't get the runoff from the hills that we get in May,
June and July. The vegetation's all green and lush and it repels a lot of that rainwater. When you have
more vegetation, it'll absorb more of that
Or it also I mean allows less to get into the ground it runs off gets into the stormwater ditches and
exits the problem now coming into contact with the trash That's it Well, so other landfills Some places
have No pond or they have a covered pond. I mean you're just pointing out. This is a a
as a factor, so I'm just curious if it's different elsewhere. Want to know the estimates Mr. Pulse has
gotten to cover the pond? I know. Cool with it being open. I'm just curious, honestly. Covering the
pond is something we've investigated, and there's a handful of options that cost aside or are reasonable
to do, but they're expensive. It's hundreds of thousands of dollars.
to do that. And there are also a number of facilities that are closer to a municipal waterworks and
can do a direct connect on the sewer line. Okay, thank you. All right, any other comments or questions
on that report? All right, seeing none, thank you, Mr. Paulson.
We now I think are at the point in the agenda for general public comments. Are there any members of
the public who would like to make a comment? Don't all rush here at once. All right. And then we have
comments from directors. Would any director like to make a comment at this time?
I think that is it for today, so we are adjourned. Thank you.