El Dorado Solid Waste Advisory Committee - Regular Meeting

Great. They've been they've been working really hard. She'll even she goes in person,

and she's just here. Hey, guys. Still waiting on a

lot of people down here, so just a few member minutes. Okay?

We we have the phone. From. Right.

Only It was

Only, like, two of us right now.

Well, yeah, another question. In terms of the food, you need to have,

like, food to go to

a food closet or something, do you have enough places to that are requesting food, or do you have capacity for more organizations? Since we talked about well, one is just with with the grocery stores and with restaurants where they have food that they're gonna go with. Got that all set up. Yeah. We talked about maybe having that something like that down here. So don't know. I remember I'm trying to give them a specific chair possible. I Yeah. Upper room. Yeah.

So we met the number room, and this people. The challenge of understanding the is that restaurants are having a about Yeah. Okay. So those conversations kinda. I think Oh, they have capacity? They're both there. Yes. But there may be others also. Yep. So she's the part of the contract. It's included in of ours. It does. Yeah. So she's now outreaching for all of the small Yeah. Like, it's like figuring out what would contain, what certain people of all of that capacity.

So we're gonna kinda have a little database that we're building. Okay. That way, my goal is same. Yeah. Should be great. So Great. But we have to build those relationships. We have to get that information so that

they can nice. You turn the heat on them? I did not turn

the heat. So so yeah. I think We're

heat the store.

Once our contract's done with free,

we'll have a full

box is

not coming from our doctor. Or

Ideally, we'd be on the. Hey

there. How are you? Good. How are Dan. Oh, thanks. Sorry. I thought we were I thought I was gonna be the last one here.

It's You

know, they're perfect.

I think since the heater's on there, we're gonna

leave it up. So we don't.

Well, I went to.

Went

to.

We can. Cool. That was fun.

Do mind if I place you up here?

Not at all. Mister Jeff, good morning. For it. Doing

alright. Hey, Southlake. We need one more for a quorum. Just waiting on one more person.

I was reading.

Yeah. My apologies. I'm not seeing your email earlier. You Oh,

okay. I didn't expect it, as I said, much

more often, but I I don't know what happened right now. Out of the loop.

Yeah. Well, thank family, my work, and

then that's my personal, and I'm Unbelievable. Right? I

dare you. I'm not. I have the second ones

that I, you know, I check them

visually in my personal name.

Placerville, we're plus one here. We got Katie. We should be good. No?

We have to have six down here to have a quorum, technically. I have five right now, so I'm waiting on Dina.

Oh, okay.

Mike Churchill. Laurel Stroud's not gonna be here. Just hoping one of those three show up. Dina probably should show up. I think she didn't say no.

Yeah. It's a weird technicality. I have to have the majority of the membership here, six out of 11. You guys could be up there because you're an approved location, but we gotta have six here. Thank you, Brown Act.

Julie, can you get the

phone call, Dina?

Oh, yeah.

She met at first. Yeah. It's rough.

When you just say, will you be here? Please RSVP.

Normally, you do do that

in the first year.

I did? Yeah. Yeah. Oh, did you? I didn't see that. I may have said I was coming.

I I set out very I mean, everything's on Legistar. All the dates are posted. The agenda is posted. There's a calendar that's approved at the beginning of the year.

It's She didn't send out

the email. Don't forget to trim your clocks. Yeah. Oh.

Wanna take the elephant off. Yeah. Not not reminding all of you of daylight savings. No. He gave me

a call. Hey. Super

awesome. Would you

mind giving me the phone wake up call?

Yeah. Not a little bit.

Six how about six in

the morning? By time you get up?

I'm pretty gone.

Yeah. So it's just even up halfway driving.

She's not answering, so that hopefully means she's

on. Yeah. Okay.

We had a roadwork. Hit There

we go. Six. Alright. Alright.

So we're gonna begin.

Let me do some housekeeping, make sure everyone's here. Hang on a sec. We got a lot of participants. Wanna make sure everybody get back and talk or should be talking is is talking. Okay.

Yeah. You're not new to hear. Okay. You guys good in Southlake? Can you unmute? Alright. Thank you.

All set up here. Three attendant attending.

Call the meeting, to order at 10:06.

Oh, this audio is awful. Yeah. Shit. Sorry.

Make sure you speak up.

I don't know that. Call in the meeting to order at 10:06.

Sure. The

roll call, Brett, before the flight salute. Ten

Oh, yeah. Hang on. Sorry. I have a mic. Okay.

So roll call.

Can you guys see the American flag? Here.

John. Present. Laura was absent. Doug. Here. Katie.

Kate. Katie?

Here. K. Thank you. Sarah?

Here.

Tina? Here. Michael? Absent. Terry? Here. Christopher? Here. Catherine? Here. K. Anush?

Aye.

Isabel? So spell oh, I'm sorry. I'm doing alternates. I should not be doing alternates. Okay. Alright. So we did the roll call, the remote meeting approvals.

They're up in Southlake. Folks are up in their approved locations. We're good to go.

Okay. So pledge of allegiance to the flag.

Thank you.

Next is open forum. So this is an opportunity for members of the public to address issues not on the agenda. Any comments?

Don't think we have any members of the public here. Online, are there any members of the public? You can raise your hand. Oh, hi. Lenore Thwami is here. Okay. I'm gonna allow you to talk, Lenore.

Okay.

Hi there. Can you we've allowed you to talk, but can you unmute your mic microphone, please?

Yeah. Yeah. Okay.

We see your hand raised. I've allowed you to unmute your mic. You gotta unmute your mic so you can talk, Lenore.

I know sometimes it can be frustrating.

No. Take your time. Take your time. Take your time. There's no rush. We we don't have any thing else to do. Let's see. Just take your time. You can also chat it. I can try to I can try to read it out for you if necessary. We'll do anything we can to get your context, your your comments. Let's see.

Is it in work in Tahoe?

I don't know. Lenore is just in our meeting, and I'm trying to get them the ability to talk. Not hearing anything.

Are we able to lower their hand if they raise a voice?

Yeah. I can We can

can do that. See if it was an accident or not?

Yeah. I can do that.

Well, this wouldn't the work have to be at an approved meeting site?

No. They're a member of the public. Okay. Trying to see forgive me. We don't have a lot of public comment in our meetings, so I'm just making sure I go over everything to make sure that we have a chance for Lennar to speak.

Can can we let Lenore know that if they're unable to figure it out now, we're gonna have our meeting if they wanna chime in at some other point on any Yeah. They can

always submit comments. Lenore, you can always submit comments directly to me, or you just send them to environmental management. I'll make sure that they're included in the meeting minutes. I'm sorry. I'm just not seeing you right now.

Cheese. Yeah. Okay. Well, we can't do anything about this. I'm sorry.

Can she hear us?

Yeah. She should be able to hear us.

Okay. Is she too by phone?

Hang on a sec. Trying to see if there's a chat option.

No.

Okay. They're gone. So I think they're give me give me thirty seconds. Leonor disappeared. I'm trying to see if they're gonna come back. Sorry. We take public comment seriously in this in this committee. It's one of the reasons we're here. So Absolutely. We will stop everything to hear what people have to say. Their opinions are far more important than ours.

Well, so equal. Oh,

maybe yours.

Equal to the group as a whole. Just give it thirty seconds. Alright. Super fortunate. We'll move on. If Lennar shows

up later in the meeting,

I think everyone agrees. We'll just see if we can drive again.

Mhmm. Yep. Yep. Alright.

Okay. We are at the consent calendar. So if there's not if there's discussion, we can pull an item. Otherwise, we could take a motion.

Let me pull up that draft and the staff report. Okay. Any comments on last month's draft or last month's draft?

Staff report.

We have a motion to approve. Motion to approve. Okay.

That does. Yes.

K. Give me a second. All in favor? Oh, we have to do the rollback?

Yeah.

Are. Dixon. Yes. Don.

Yes.

Doug. Hi. Katie. Yes. Thank you. Sarah?

Yes.

Dina? Yes. Terry? Yes. Christopher?

Yes.

Catherine? Yes.

I've got Lenore back. I'm gonna try again real quick. Just a Hi, Lenore. We're gonna give you a try to make a public comment. Oh, sorry. Try again. Alright. Okay. Can you hear us?

I can hear you. Can you hear me?

Yes. We can. Thank you.

I'm sorry. Technical difficulties on this end. I

want you to introduce who you are and just what you what public comment you'd like to make.

Okay. My my name is Lenore Toomey, and I am a resident of South Lake Tahoe.

And

I just want to comment on the alternating green waste and recycle schedule we have with South Tahoe Refuse and and actually the lack of green waste pickup in the winter because this year has been a very dry year, and I'm a little concerned with the accumulation of pine needles and pine cones on my property. And I realized that you can take them to the transfer station. But when you only have a passenger vehicle, that's not a very efficient way to address green waste. So I'm hoping I know it's the first year of, s b thirteen eighty three for us, and I'm just hoping that there's a way that we can come up with to, increase our green waste collection, possibly during dry winter months.

K. Thank you, Lenore. Really appreciate the public comment. Just we've got our SLT team here. Do you guys wanna offer any kind of response to that? We can also, you know, interface you with them to Lenore,

are you in the city of

Plaster city of South Lake Tahoe or the unincorporated area?

We're I'm in the county. I'm out Valley, actually.

Okay. Southlake, anything? You guys are muted.

Sure. This is Catherine with Salt Lake Refuse. Thanks, Lenore. Definitely, you know, appreciate that feedback. And like you said, it's the first first year of this, so, we'll certainly, you know, take it into consideration as we continue to plan for future winters.

Hey, Lenore. Again, I'm I'm Timothy Engle

with environmental management. I oversee the franchise agreements with South Tahoe Refuse and Aldorado Disposal. If you have further comments or you wanna dive into it, feel free to call me or email me. I can kinda interface with you and try to, you know, problem solve there. But, yeah, green waste accumulation is something that we take really seriously up in the lake area, the slope, and thank you for your comment.

Yes. Thank you. I appreciate it.

Alright. K. Cool. Hey. We have public comment. That was cool. Thank you. Awesome. Sweet. We never get that. So no one no one gives us much love. Okay. So Mike Churchill is here now. So that's ten out of 11 people. So, Mike, you missed one vote, but you're here. So now we're moving on to discussion item three. Right, Dixon? Yes.

Okay. We are.

Okay.

Let me pull those up. Let me pull those up.

Okay. Okay. Discussion amount of three waste recycling tonnage reports. Just wanna make sure everyone's here. Got Christina and Nathan up here. So if you guys wanna talk, just raise your hands. I know this might you might have context here. Just let me know. Okay. Southlake, can you see this? Yes. Okay. Okay. So let's do EDDs first. Again, I'm using a rolling system kind of showing diversion rates, inputting their data.

We got until February here. And then some fancy graphs. Any comments?

I guess just, you know, we're not seeing rates go up yet. I mean, it's getting more of a downward trend recently. And I think this thing ties in, you know, later with the strategic plan and having some targets for some specific things because there's a lot of strategies so that we could see this is what we would expect from this, and this is kind of where we are. So, I mean, I know we've had a lot of hitting the facility, etcetera, but seems like now we've got those things in place. So any comments on that? Or

Yeah. I mean, look. I can talk to if you're if you're looking at the 31% number, I I would encourage you not to hyper fixate on any single month's number because as you can see kind of over the past past, you know, years, that number changes throughout the year based on seasonality. So, you know, I mean, we we were down, you know, roughly a 100 tons of green waste. A lot of that is just weather. Right? You get a wet you get a wet first few weeks in February and people stop doing yard work and stuff like that, and that's reflected in the in the CNV number as well. I mean, contractors, where we get most of the CNV stuff if if they're not building the homes or working because it's raining

Right.

Then then it's just, you know, materially, we're we're taking a little bit less, there. And so, you know, you see a drop in the percentage. But over the course of the year, I think you'll see those numbers continue to jump back in and kinda where they align seasonally. But, yeah, you know, as we kinda outlined in the strategic plan, which is also important here, you know, that's where we'll discuss more of, know, you things we have coming in '25 and when we see opportunity and things like that.

Southlake, did you have a comment?

No. Nope.

No. That's why you raised your hand. I'm sorry.

Oh, I was just we're gonna request that Dixon speak up a little bit more. We really have a struggle to hear her. Sorry. Last comment.

I can't I'm trying to triangulate the mic where it is in here. I don't actually know. So I'll try to fix that.

Or the microphone. The mic. Yeah. Alright.

Which is

fine. Okay. Any more comments on that?

Yeah. Just one, just to piggyback on what Bruce was saying. I like to brought up a point that when you look at the overall data, you're looking at up and down, up and down, up and down. But here again, probably the most important piece of data is 80% diversion that we could compare the toll at the end of the year. I'm sending, like, annual.

I mean, we're still we don't have that. When I look at something like this is report, I'm not gonna sit down and start back on the going over numbers to see if they're. So here again, it seems like we should have like we have here on the South Lake Tahoe. So thank you for also including volume. Didn't the version summary, the way you've been tracking with all these years because that's that's probably 59.9. That's probably the most important number that we're tracking right now. So it still would be helpful to have the totals on these years, but

I got the. Okay. Yeah. That's that's all year. Right?

Because there is a variant taste that we know, especially in Tahoe, quite obvious because of the seasonality. June, July, and August, and you see those big ups and downs because of.

Did you do it? Looks like I had a No.

I'm I'm not gonna do that every time now. I mean, this is basically it's still just a data sheet. It's really not a problem. Yeah. It's still in there. To report the problems.

Alright. So if we are at discussion, and we do not this is a discussion item, not an action item. So why don't we move on to number four then?

What's Oh, Did we

We didn't look at Southern.

Did we didn't look at South Tahoe?

Maybe I just didn't hear any comments.

Sorry. Let me pull it up real quick. Surprise. Can you guys hear

me? Yep.

Okay. South Tahoe, I took the liberty of taking your actual data that you submit and putting it in a historical format like EDDs. Going back to 2022, I I wanted to not do too much until I had more authorization or just kinda, like, more input from you guys. But I think it's really cool. You can see the seasonality as well in this data. It's just so night and day. You guys are more consistent, and South Tahoe is just wildly seasonal. Mhmm. So now look at that. ADC, the direct export, even the recycling centers, which is really fascinating.

And that's one of the most shocking graphs is looking at that versus that just wild swings. So I don't know if you guys like this. I attached the original one in case, but, do you guys have any comments on this data or anything else you wanna talk about with recording?

No? Nope.

K. Do you like the data? Is it okay?

Yeah. I mean, it'd be nice to, I like how there's a couple of years at a time. Even would love to see if it you know, three, four, five years at a time. So if you keep on this way.

Cool. Tim, I can send you all that in Excel if you want. Yeah.

Sure. Yeah. I just kinda plugged it in. I can I have the historical data? I just only went back to 2002 or 2022 because of time constraints. But I'll I'll I'm happy to go. This depends on the resolution you wanna see, but otherwise, okay?

Yeah. Sure. I'll send you I'll send you some more. Okay.

The okay.

Hey, Kim. I think it probably just Dawn on me. Just hit me. The reason that you changed to this new format is because that data is what you need to get generate those graphs. Is that is that why we shifted to this massive Yeah. This

format, I mean, shows you a better breakdown of of different trends over time. You know, the one the resolutions the last couple of years, and it allows us to to show show some graphs to show some seasonality to see if we're on the right track. I mean, I could do some, obviously, sophisticated statistical analysis, but one of the reasons I use EDDs cut off about 2023 is you guys started taking food waste then and kinda changed operations. And I I wanted to provide context for the new MERV. STR has been kinda cataloging the same thing for a pretty long time, and so I just wanted to create standardized formats for EdSwag.

To be frank, this doesn't require a lot of work. It just allows me to function a number a few times, and then you guys get a rolling graph that's predictable and standardized, which is what you've really always wanted. You wanted the STR and GBDs reporting to be the same.

Yeah.

So Yeah. They look the same now.

That's great. So

But this real quick, an answer to your question. That first year, 2023 is 35.68%, and 2024 is 32.65%.

Yeah. And if you want compounded numbers by quarter or annual, I can do those. I just didn't I didn't I didn't read it on, but I was gonna create a secondary section, a secondary statistics section that sort of quarterly and annual. I just wanted to make sure I captured all the data and see if STR liked their format, their report in this format. Remember, I'm just staff. And if you're if STR wants to submit their version, what they submit, their choice. I have no authority to say. You know, oops. This is absolute. It's your authority for answering. So I thought everyone liked it.

Yeah. I

would I would add too, Tim, and I don't know how much how what your capability is here, but I think it's really important to remember that they touch a lot more material than we do. Yeah. So the this percentage is always gonna be drastically different than STR. But if if you took our number and combined it with the county's diversion for the tables and the big box stores that are following their own, you might get closer to, you know, a combined number.

But The numbers are context. I mean, we we have to be explaining them with context. But as long as they're relative to each other itself, like, you're that's why I don't include pre 02/2022 data with you guys because it's just like you changed a lot of operations at your point. I don't think it has as much context. STR is more consistent. But, yeah, they they get a lot of points on direct export, EDC, and stuff like that that you're not necessarily So, you know, again, diversion numbers by the state proven to be kind of, you know, witchcraft a little bit. So I I do wanna focus on the context and our overall PPD number, which is what's gonna be guiding us.

So come back at number four on the agenda.

Yeah.

From the management department, committee receive and file the current health rights proposal. Reports.

Yeah. I'll bring up UnionMind first just for context. I included two borders here just just because, you know, it's not all work. It's just context. So you know, mine's kind of the same story. In q three, we had a lot of nothing, really. And then in q oh, what? I put up. Sorry. End up the same ones.

Q four. Yeah. Lot of nothing. Landfill has been kind of having some disruptions recently or the the facility, so I don't think we've sent out a lot of biosolids recently, but not much to report over there. We did just to context, we did because it's related to RDRS, and I'll discuss a little bit more later.

The county's talking about taking over the local enforcement agency. It may be the landfill administration of the county, but we would not be doing Union We're gonna outsource that to somebody else because it's a conflict of interest. We run it, so we'd be inspecting ourselves. So Union Mine will continue to be inspected by Just a just a little context there. EDD, you guys got anything you wanna discuss? Pretty boilerplate in input. Here's your recycling numbers.

Tim, on that one, there's a section there where we talk about the $13.83. We'll talk about the, like, the ten day when you go and you you do, like, a characterization. You know? And it shows how much if I understand it right, it shows how much you you pull out, like, contaminants out of there. That looked like that was, like, a really low number. That was, like, point zero five, which seems to indicate that we're doing pretty good as far as contamination, but it's going in those green waste pits. Is that was I reading that right?

Yep. Yeah. Organics have been has been really pretty clean for us. You know, contaminants and greenness, if we see it really at all, it's usually bag big black trash bags. But we've noticed really for a few years. I mean, we changed a couple of things a few years back with contract amendments to require, like, paper compostable bags, which really helped get the black bags out of the green waste stream. So the organics or green waste stream has been really cleaned. Yeah.

Something we're kind of freaked out about because we've got a good thing going on right now. But as we expand S B 1383, contamination will increase as you've seen Yeah. Public events and stuff. So that's why we're kinda taking a careful approach.

And and that's a good point too, Tim. I mean, you you gotta understand what the the new S B 1383 allows for more to go in the green waste stream, so pizza boxes and food soil papers and things like that. But, thankfully, we haven't seen a high level of people just using it as an extra trash container or an extra recycling container. It's been it's been pretty clean. I think we would like to see more food in there. Mhmm. But but, generally, yeah, the material's clean.

Yeah.

And that's also reflecting in the number of boot stacks that you're

you're conditioning. They're they're getting much lower. Not for recycle, but for Yeah. Organics. Yeah. Yeah. We don't we don't we don't do a lot of tagging for the organics waste stream. Definitely do a lot of tagging.

Ironically, even though our initiatives with AB nine thirty nine to recycle started, what, thirty five years ago, there's still so much confusion with the recycling markets in our recycling markets. Whereas, you know, banana peel and green waste bin is more straightforward than this cup or this packaging material and stuff like that. Yeah. A lot more bright. Yeah.

So, I mean, it just shows you how weak the enorm recycling movement was. There was just you know, I I even bought a just for context, I bought a dump truck, a recycling truck for my son. He loves those. Julie got my son one, but this one was like it has a song, and it says, if it see if you see those three arrows, that means it can be recycled. And I was just like, no. It's wrong.

Lie. So

even now, they're still getting it wrong. So so, yeah, we're gonna try to not do that with Ovanic, not step in with that problem. So it's day. Any other comments for EDDs, RDRS reports?

I didn't I was just sort of looking at trends. So between quarter three and quarter four, some of it may seasonality that there was less there's more recycling. Mhmm. And less going to the. So and then looking at STRs, they have a lot of asphalt. Oh my gosh. I looked at these numbers. They were huge. It's like, oh, it's asphalt.

STR. Your asphalt is

Asphalt.

Yeah. Your asphalt numbers are big. Why why are your asphalt numbers big? Weird question.

I'm doing road work. Yeah. Because it's winter.

Yeah.

Road work.

We can hear you.

But you're still doing, yeah, still doing some road work in the 2024.

Okay. Yeah. Wow. I'll ask. Well, thanks for the context. Yeah. You see some wild stuff with this this report. Yeah. SDR, do you wanna comment on or anyone in Southlake wanna comment on your RDRS report, or there's nothing remarkable that you wish to

point out? Okay. Anybody else? John? Just real quick on the the Tahoe asphalt Yeah. And then on the Abel beginners. Just quickly refresh my mind. The the Tahoe refuse is being delivered to you and then to them. And then with you, is it being delivered to you, and then you're taking it to ABLE, or it's just a direct pass through, and then ABLE's reporting it to you?

We don't Abel doesn't report, anything to us, so we'll collect the concrete material.

Uh-huh.

Yeah. We'll basically weigh it, bring it through our facility, and take it straight straight out to Abel. So we're reflecting the material that we collect, but it's not leaving our disposal in the fact of grinding. So it's we capture, hey. We we hauled 10 tens of concrete, and we'll we'll report and reflect that. We don't report what Able what leaves Able's facility. Okay. Yeah.

So some people direct haul to Abe. Yeah. You know? Especially people in the industry and stuff. So we're not capturing that in EDD's diversion rates. STR is a different situation where they're the point, you know, where asphalt goes. So they have significantly larger numbers. If Abel went through EDD with all their materials, you would see very different diversion rates for them. That's why it's always important to take facility diversion rates in context. It depends on the material that they're taking in.

If you kinda it's kinda like as if you have a, you know, you have a a disadvantage when it comes to pumping your new person as long as you explain them in context. Okay. Now I could go run over there and make Abel give me their numbers and say, how much are you guys, you know, recycling or something like that? But that's not a facility's department. Okay. That would be the county's area.

So it's just a a better way to measure

Yeah.

To capture those numbers. So, essentially, we don't have a cost associated as a franchise or as the ratepayers, we don't have a cost associated with managing all that waste that goes to Abe. We don't have a cost for that.

That's Abe That's Abe.

That's a cost

for Abe. That's not technically just an They have the ability to accept asphalt and concrete from, like, small projects and stuff like that, but anybody who's disposing of concrete or asphalt going directly with Able is doing business with Able. They're not they're not Right. Okay. Business with the ratepayers. Okay.

So it's an efficient method of actually counting.

Yeah. I mean, you can say that.

Mhmm.

Cool. But, yeah, Tahoe operations are smaller, much limited. STR is one of the only disposal facilities up there, period. So they they average. Got it. Alright.

I just did wanna clarify. So we have a partnership with Tahoe Asphalt where they actually do receive some of that material directly.

Okay.

But it's, like I said, sort of a partnership. We have an MOU, so it's both administratively and financially, we do contribute.

Okay. Mhmm.

And the reason

We wouldn't be able to accept that much material at our facility.

Okay. The reason I was asking was as we're doing this salvage management plan revision, which I'm trying to kinda get an idea of the effectiveness of of how we're doing. It's just kinda helpful to know based on stuff that's coming in, how much of it is actually part of the efficiency of of our operation and with the actual MRF itself. Right. Right? That's the main reason why I was just trying to clarify that one.

And when you're doing this all risk management plan review, one of my tips was that you look at both facility numbers and the county numbers in context because, you know, again, your facilities are just part of the explanation. And when you look at the county numbers, that's why you see different diversion. You don't see, you know, EDB is 33 diversion rate because it's accounting for a lot more. Okay. I'm gonna move on.

We are in item number five, and the first would be the conclusion letter. So I'm thinking maybe we would go through these three attachments and then talk about what we're doing with s t 13 in the previous invitation.

So I attached these to talk about

The first with the cap.

Yeah. The cap. So I'll do this one, Julie. So we're done. Our corrective action plan is complete. We've we've completed our the county's corrective action plan is complete. We completed our last task, which was an effort to contact essentially self haulers, nonsubscribers, to help them understand s b 13 80 three. Item number c is our mailer that went out. You might ask why we waited so long to do this. I think the answer is pretty obvious.

This is a pretty sensitive population. I'm telling them that they have to sort their food waste to do a truck, know, you and bring it to the MERV every week, every seven days was not an easy thing to discuss. So we wanted to be very gentle about it and, like, you know, kinda be there to help, and we wouldn't want EDD to get bum rushed with a bunch of people that were super angry about this and stuff like that. So it went really well. And so Julie can talk more about it.

But CalRecycle deemed that we had met our obligations as the county, so we are the corrective action plan is done. The only thing left is a potential implementation record review, meaning that they just kinda go through our files and just check and see if everything's okay. But, otherwise, Power Cycle's kind of off of our backs. Tina?

On the letter that you sent out, how did you send it out? I mean, was it just in

It was a mailer that just went out in the mail. It was You

have, like, an area you did or just

So we focused on we focused on people that had trash service but didn't have green waste service. So we worked with EDD to get their that information. We're gonna we're gonna move on to nonsubscribers. People are, like, not subscribed to trash and waste service at all. That's coming next. We expect more resistance with that group Okay. And more confusion. So we wanted to get this mailer right to kinda tweak it, and then we're gonna move on to probably more mailers that focus on the I don't have service at all. So it's a little bit harder to find those folks because there's no list of them. It's basically everyone that's not in the county that doesn't have EDD service. Tricky thing to parse out.

So did this already go out? Yes.

This went out via social media, and

Looks like February 20. Yeah.

About 8,500 customers.

8,500 customers. Responses.

Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. So we had I attached our survey. And

tracked the phone.

Yeah. So so yeah. Right. Exactly. Have trash. Don't have green mushrooms.

I've created this survey on the mailer and also on our social media post. I mean, so this is kind of a lot of people were able to provide you a feedback through the survey. Sure. And so we do get phone calls, but most of them are just questions or not. I actually had a lot of them that were like, hey. I do want free service. I don't wanna self haul it, but I get a green noise.

So

So that yeah. So that

I didn't this was one of the most You didn't even know who's an option?

Yeah. Yeah.

This is one of the most illuminating graphs for me was the response to the because it's been a rolling survey. It's not just with it wasn't just with the mailer. But would you like to have an organic waste service in addition to your normal service, minimal charges apply? You see that spike of no? That was the mailer.

Oh, yeah.

So so even though when we did broad social media and said, hey. Would you like Greenway service? Most about a little over 50% of the people said, yeah. Sure. I would love Greenway service. But when we mailed the people that didn't have Greenway service, the mailer had trash service, and we asked them, we got a stronger no response. Yeah. What I'm curious to see is what happens when we mail the people that don't have trash service at all, but kind of yes, no response.

So so all the other bars are through social media interaction?

Yeah. So we didn't put out the mailer until February. Yeah. It'll be social media. So if you look at it in general, the county, yes, probably wants organic. You know, they want organic service. But when you targeted that population that didn't have service, the answer was more no. That doesn't mean that we can't make service initiatives. That that if you boil that number down to Auburn Lake Trails, it might be different, or it might be, like, different if we talk about outing. We've we've had people express interest in those areas getting bring the service, and we're working with some of them right now.

But we are looking at broad applications of the county. We're still generally with people that don't have the service, generally still, I'm okay with that.

A little over 600 respondents to this. Yeah.

We'll kinda keep bringing back this data. And, again, we got phone calls that were pretty happy. Most people were just questions. A lot of people signed up for service for EDD and were interested in Circle. So that was good. Get some people on the on the routes. And, yeah, otherwise, it's fine.

And it's worse.

Oh. So

I didn't have this one

of interest to this group.

Yeah. I didn't would you like trash service to be required for all residents in your area? 53 to 48 40 excuse me. 53472 43 against two fifteen. So the answer was yes. I don't I didn't provide context about from the mailer here over time. Didn't know why I didn't do that. I I must have forgot to put that on this sheet, but I would like to see how those people responded after the mailer. But overall, we still have a majority from the people. So Okay.

You know? Small majority. Just small majority. But, again, I think what's most appropriate, the strategy that we're taking right now again, Ed Swag is free to, you know, pursue any strategy they so wish. But right now, what we're working with with EDP is when we get stakeholders from certain areas like Auburn Lake Trails or Outingdale or Grizzly Flat that express an interest from service, we try to build community support through fire safe councils, through homeowners associations, and just see if this is possible.

Because, obviously, they wanna get people on route to what serves their interests, and then we capture more people and that have curbside service and stuff. So I think working with these communities individually has been the best success. I don't know how close we are to everybody has to have mandatory service yet. It's like It's a political decision beyond my pay pay. They'll have to look at these numbers.

I'm Chris,

I'm still waiting for

a green waste bin in my business.

K. Let's get you one.

I've been asking you for for a month for a year for a year. Because we have lawn, and we have trees. And I I I don't hire a commercial service to do it. I can do it myself. So

I don't I don't have

a place to put it. You know? So, like,

I could have put it in

my vehicle and haul it off, but, like,

I don't even do that to my house. Why would I do it for my my business? Are

they you calling them, and they're just saying no?

Or It's an odd thing to have a plastic can for a business. It's not a normal thing. But I am in somewhat of a residential area anyway, so there's gotta be trucks nearby. Like We will find a way to

get cheaper. Mhmm. You got it.

You got it.

Because my dad can

tell the cops to move the trash. Oh, that's bad. And I tell him not

to do that. And he's like, well, were we supposed to put it? No. Like, well,

well The

empty lot across the street.

Except there's gonna be a quick, quick car wash there. Yeah.

Tim, I had I had Skype for busy. Yes. Conversations on on another one before you move on.

Which one?

The one we were just on.

The mailer or this? The survey.

Survey. Yeah. Was this all done by DMD, or was this part of that JBS brand that that did this survey?

This was all in the stuff. BDD helped us out with kinda, you know, getting our customer lists and promoting it and answering questions. They got a heads up and stuff, but this was just our initiative. This wasn't any greater. And, you know, you do have some data pollution here. There was a social media post that kinda went over this and appealed to everybody in the county. Everybody could see it. It wasn't just the nonsubscribers. So that's why I pointed out this time data Mhmm. Right here that showed that spike in no.

But, you know, we're gonna look at that. And, again, I I don't even I

guess I said before, I don't even think that's fair because it depends on where you are in the unincorporated area in the non saltwater areas. They some of that might be Auburn Lake Trails, and some of that might be Georgetown. You know, I don't I haven't broken that.

I don't know

who's Julie, can we even do that?

Some of your guys'. Think it was. Okay.

If people submitted their address, I could if people submitted their addresses, I could get, like, a relationship about which census district, like, what and something like that. Yeah. We'll see what kind of extraction we can get, you know, more data. Mike?

I thought I thought I I've

had this question before, and it's is is there a way to have, like, community pickup? Because, like, I've seen situations where there's, like, a guy. He's got, a side by side or an ATV or whatever. He, like, hauled all his cans down to, like, this front

of the street or something.

Yeah. We have community pickup areas all over the county. If you go to any large drive

I think I think they're saying, like, dumpster. Like, Or

some some way to, like

Satellite sites.

Yeah. Yeah. Some way to Satellite sites That's what I heard.

Have always been kinda, like, one of the holy grails for, like, a rural area. Chris can talk more about this. SDRs have some experience with this. They tend to work great on paper because it's like, wow. Everyone can drive down the street and throw my trash away there and stuff like that. And then EDD comes and hauls it away until someone puts oil, and then Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Someone throws a water in there and stuff. So there's gotta be a

way to mitigate mitigate that. Like Factory staff? I was thinking like, there are people who have cell towers on their property. Mhmm. They're they're on their property. They have access to them. It's secure. You know, not anybody can just go and tamper with the. Right? That's on somebody's property. So you'd have to have somebody that would maybe be willing to have a, like, a concrete bunker set up with a can on their property that's kept secure and monitored. But that person knows that their neighbors

are gonna be using it, and they trust each other.

Yeah. I mean, I don't know.

It's every time we try to experiment

You guys altruistic.

Yeah. Every time we try to experiment with it, we've had contamination issues. I mean, even before your guys' time, we had contamination issues in the past. People drop off stuff. People steal from them. Yeah. People break into them. It's kind of like I mean, the MRF itself has what are you guys? Putting up an electrified fence right now? You know? The people come in and Yeah. They don't go break into the buildings. They can break into the waste Yeah. And steal the waste. So, I mean, people steal trash.

So it's it's it's kind of it can be a real nuisance. If it gets above a certain size of, obviously, trash I mean, we don't have we have difficult laws where, like, on any private parcel but the MERC, you we're not allowed to accumulate waste over seven days. So you would have to get a solid waste facility permit. All of a sudden, you're a solid waste facility now, and you're subject to all the rules of the solid waste facility. You know, you have stormwater rules.

You have carb rules. You have all that kind of stuff and the public pushback. I mean, everyone and a lot of people in theory want this kind of stuff until it's right next to them. And they're like, actually, I don't. So that's why UDD tries to do their community cleanups and stuff and their pickup events and, you know, collection events and stuff. But Well satellite sites are most not

functional. What if you guys

what if there was, like, you know, social media if if you just encourage somebody to, like, find some way to have, like, a community compost site or something?

Community compost? Rural areas. Community compost sites are one of those things that's absolutely in development and is definitely on the table. The state wants them. They can be expedited through the permit process. We're working I mean, I'm working with 40 right now on one. You know? He's trying to get one going on and work with you guys. He's trying to get a he's trying to get a composting site up.

What is it called Roseville?

South Shingle? Oh, yeah. Yes. Yeah. He's trying to get one going on South Shingle. I just just met with Concordia John the other day about it. So we're trying to get these things moving, but there is a permit lift with these kind of sites that can't just can't just have, like, a massive trash recycling simulation site. You know, like, it would be nice if we could do that. But, realistically, with environmental concerns, there's a lot of you gotta all of a sudden be but, like, Mountain Enterprises, for example, is a is a is a site. They accept a lot of organic waste, process a lot of waste.

They're inspected by our local enforcement agency program as a as a facility. So yeah. But you have to get in that permit here. I don't think satellite sites are off the table, but I just don't know if they're working pretty on these operational style.

I'd imagine it's harder to one of those things where the end goal is really good, but getting there is challenging. You know, if you're gonna set up a community, we'll call it, you know, organics disposal site, you know, Are you now asking every Auburn Lake Trails resident to pay a little bit more for a group? Like, then the setup to get to that point would be probably more challenging than a simple one. It's like, oh, yeah. We'll just drop it there, and everybody can bring it there. And, you know, somebody's gotta get billed.

Staffing them is tricky. I mean, you guys staff the recycling centers during all the business operations, but no one's there. Hate people trying to break in and stuff like that. So security is a real like, it seems crazy that security is such a ridiculous issue with trash, but it seems to keep coming up. Like, people just steal trash.

Somewhere like in Apple Hill area, where which farms. I imagine they they're composting their own stuff, they? Mhmm.

Yeah. I mean, they're using I mean, they they use every bit of compost they can get, so they have compost piles.

They're allowed to do that.

You're allowed to just have a compost pile at a property. So that's fine. But it gets starts getting weird when you start accepting a lot of it from other people and you start accumulating it and starts if you're not properly managing it, then then things start getting weird, especially and that get all these complaints about that. Like, the wineries are like, hey. Like, I have purple runoff in my, you know, backyard creek from winery down in Somerset, and they're not managing this correctly.

They have a lot of horse composting problems. People Yeah. Certain times of the year, they just don't wanna pick it up, and then it starts accumulating. And, you know, you're technically you're you're supposed to leave it in the field and let it dry out. But if some people like to put it in piles, then they don't turn the piles, then real bad stuff starts to happen.

So we're do, like, around the like, what's happening with Yeah. The thirteen eighty three implementation?

Well, that's the county's. If anybody else wants to go. How about the city of?

Well, we're still working on the compost cover. Mhmm. We're gonna go to an event with the without our disposal, and we're trying to get all of our businesses on Main Street to get a fee and ask for helping to manage the garbage enclosures inside of the

Parking garage.

Parking garage. Sorry. So and then we're thinking about doing community gardening as well, so we're working on that. Oh, negotiation. Mean, The feet part is our first choice. It's been cool. And we'll have a woman in the community who really wants some preventive garden. So We got her online, but she would actually start a nonprofit and then actually then decide, you know, get volunteers for it. Mhmm. Cool.

Right. So city property.

And then we have this this person designated as someone to maintain.

Yeah. So she'd have to be don't have insurance because she's gonna be operating on sick property.

What would be the what's the what would be the end goal of the garden?

Well, she's just really passionate about it. In that area, there's a lot of housing. There's low income. There's affordable housing up there. There's senior housing up there.

So, like, what would they be looking you? So I'm assuming the purpose would be actually Eat it. People would eat it.

Nobody dish. Yeah.

But, like, who had

to say it to

People who wanna join in and actually work in the garden. You would apply. Yeah. So you'd have this kind of like a kind of situation. You have to work the garden to get

Do people have individual infections?

Or gonna be set up in.

I did this in college, so, like, I'm aware

of how they get they can get political.

They can't. That's why we don't wanna operate. I found a little bit stuck.

Don't. I knew that.

The community garden afterwards. Okay. Okay. City of South Lake Tahoe. You guys wanna talk about s b 13 a three?

I think we're just kinda plugging along, trying to get the middle school to join in on food waste diversion efforts. It's a little more challenging than the elementaries. Did some reinforcement at the elementary schools of late and can't think of anything else for for those.

Yeah. Just continuing our distribution of countertop food waste buckets. Yeah.

Okay. Awesome. Thank you. Elder Hills.

Yeah. Don't have too much more

of an update since last time. We were gonna the only thing we're looking at doing, like, a campaign in social media and send out flyers. Probably in April, I mean, the best timing just because things are starting to warm up, and so it'll become an issue again. But, yeah, you just have to make it happen. Worked a little bit with Julie to kinda connect with some of the schools because I think that is the group of getting this now about the 1383. That's their best efforts. But I think the county's mainly taking that on so if we can subsidize that at all because we do have grant funds that we're looking at spending and talking about our disposal a little bit about that as well. So,

yeah, just moving forward. Just trying to educate education. Okay.

Karen Park, anything? No?

No. No. Just

talk about the schools. People who does not breathe. Our contract with them right now is for 10 schools. We have nine schools that have signed up on. So we're just looking to work over a school for the next school year.

And then our hope is, like, summer contract with them as right now in June. Send it one more year, you know, one more year left of funding. And so the hope would be to reach 20 more schools, and then provide at least kind of like a toolkit for the other schools and interest. So, hopefully, by the end of this year, we can already have some schools that will sign up a meal for the next ultimate or goal into the. And then Reef has also been reaching out to ethical food recovery organizations next to the schools that they're working with, build those partnerships, figure out what they can and can't do and what they can take and how they can work together.

I'm gonna ultimately get to the. So we build that contract and partnership with them, but we can at least educate them and and love their resources that they need to be as a. So, yeah, so far, it's been pretty good. It's just getting the school bus to get to see. You know? And some of them, at least, the good news is a lot of them have been in contact with us. They just express a lot of personal challenges that they have before they sign up. So so we're letting them know what their last services offered. And then after that, you know, they're on their own. We've done our best effort to provide services and education to the schools.

And then a few other things we're working on is bringing or getting interested in county facilities. And so we hope to start with parks. And parks is onboard to add a breathing system. We actually working on the first campus to do it. Which is very rare for us. I personally feel like we're always playing catch up. We're good. But yeah. And so I reached out to Power Cycle, asked for some contacts. I shared with Tim.

We got a pretty funny email from the city of San Francisco, because I asked them, you know, can you let me know how the contamination has been? You know? But do you have animal resistant bins that you're using? Because that's really what we kind of find. And she was like, it's been awful. A complete failure. And so we'll have to go into it with a grain of salt, I'm sure, but at least they're willing to. We have some creative ideas. When I used to work in parks, I would have my maintenance staff meet the facilities when they had a reservation. And that way you could coach them through the process of what they need to do.

They're also tied to that financially and that if they don't sort properly, then they could be fined through their reservation. So that's one thing kind of encouraging people better is through the reservation system. And so so we'll try some things, and hopefully, can get the help them get the supplies they need while we help them.

Have you guys already identified what that's been is the bin?

So I've seen something I like. I was at the Oakland Zoo not too long ago, and they have an animal resistant three bin, and they had their education on why, you know, you need to have this properly done. So I'm trying to get their vendor from them really.

So,

hopefully, I'll share I can share that information for sure if anyone gets interested. Yeah. I'll send them. But I think Lotus Park is probably the first one that they wanna launch at. So really soon to get Okay. Recycling your first.

Yeah. It's good.

Briefly, I can kinda speak for all the jurisdictions. 2025 is really kind of a proof of concept year. We're kinda all trying to execute the more difficult parts of s b thirteen eighty three, but carefully, and to try to figure out some things that are wrong. For example, Julie's working with Parks to try to kind of prime the whole county and all county facilities for eventually being in compliance with SB thirteen eighty three. We're gonna begin enforcement, but it's really only gonna be an enforcement a couple enforcement cases against our most bad actors.

You know, we're gonna take it through the legal system and make sure everything is, you know, appropriate that what we're doing, we're following the letter of the law. We we're we're you can never anticipate with these kind of cases what kind of pushback you're gonna have from defendants and people that are, like, supposedly in trouble. They might find hole might be able to poke holes in our case that we didn't anticipate. They might have grievances that they're like, hey. This is, an untenable position.

I'm I've tried and I can't or something. So and then the other thing that I was gonna briefly talk about, I know we need to move on, was public events. And we've decided that we wanna work on the Home and Garden show as our first kind of trial public event. Environmental management's gonna be there. I believe EDB's gonna be there, and we wanna put out green waste bins and police them.

Actually, have someone standing there. Like like, don't do that and see what happens. I mean, see if, you know, if their bite breaks out or, you know, we're gonna be handing out compost pails at the home and garden show. So it's kind of gonna be Don, you've been pushing this a lot to get our public events going. But rather than doing them all and failing and getting horrible contamination, which anybody who's gone out to eat recently in a public place has seen, I did I just did at the Galleria. It was catastrophic. You know? They have an organic waste bin that was filled with plastic. But we wanna just kinda work out the kinks at this home and garden show and get the vendors on. We're gonna talk to the vendors.

We're gonna talk to everybody who's involved to try to see if we can execute, get real recovery without contamination with this event.

So are you requiring your vendors to to have

Not requiring yet. But that might be that might be something that we we do after the Home and Garden show and do that demonstration. So but we don't we have to be careful about that because we don't wanna, like, shut out these events and get them canceled because all of a sudden, there's no vendors that are gonna accept this. So Okay. There's a lot of there's a lot of feedback talking to the actual vendors, seeing if that you know, what works for them and what doesn't. The the citizens that are at the event, you need all the stakeholders will be there. And I'm going to invite EDSWAC members to be there if you wanna participate and help be be the track police. Don, I'm I'm seeing you standing in front of an organic waste bin for some flowers and telling people what to do.

I'll do it, but if you'll go ahead and do something on the recommendation.

Yeah. So, seriously, this is this is something we wanna get at Swack involved with. So the Home and Garden shows in the May, May or something. Yeah. So we'll reach out.

What about reaching making it part of the coordinator's responsibility instead of the vendors? Because I can't see each vendor having a van. You know? Yeah. But the coordinator

Oh, it it'll be the home and garden show coordinator will be responsible for I mean, EDD's gonna work with them. Yeah.

Helpful. And then I also love our fund department know that when they get their package to make sure that I'm informed about it. Yeah. Yeah. They should be part of the coordinator application.

It's It that's technically what we're what we're going to do in the long run is, like, if you're gonna have a public event with x amount of people, you have to have vendors that have food, you know, food recyclable materials and stuff like that. But we do wanna see an action first to get a proof of concept to see, okay, what's going wrong? Just because

I

mean, a good example is when I went to the Galleria last week with my son and my wife, I got slight I got, what, Shake Shack. Everything was compostable except, like, a couple things, and those were going into the compost. But and I had to sort it. You know, I was just like the mustard packet, straw. So I we wanna look at those details because it's all about the details of these kind of events and and kinda troubleshoot it and figure out what we can do to make it best. There might be certain vendors that are like, I wanna do that, and there might be also vendors that are like, I'm not coming

back. Okay.

Yeah. So we need to that's a real choice. And EDD is there too, so it's an excellent opportunity for them to just monitor their cans and see what's going on. I invite I'll I'll Julie's gonna be coordinating the event. I'm gonna be there quarterbacking it. So we'll try to get SWAC members involved. But if you wanna come by and and help us, we would like to have your help.

You might also might consider caters if you're a volunteer in here. So John Sanders, who's I would consider it would be too. Mhmm. They do a lot of events.

Yeah.

So if you're working with them and they know what it is, and I would think they'd be amenable. Mhmm.

Yeah. And we also wanna interface with them and see what they're seeing in other counties. Like, what these people go work events in Sacramento County, and they go work events other places. So I'm gonna talk to them about that too. But, anyway, proof of concept 2020 plan.

Real quickly. When you said if I wouldn't mind standing in front of a compost bin, I've done this many times on the this Eldorado Hills CSD. They have those big flags and the collection areas, and they have the Oh, yeah. With the cans that you provide in different colored cans. And I watched that.

I actually stand there and I watch it, and it it was amazing to me that when they come up to those cans and it shows what's it has been the placard on or on front of what goes in this can. It's amazing to see people with their garbage, and they're actually trying to figure out and then to put the right thing in the right can. Mhmm. Now when I go to the the the concerts over in in El Dorado down Old Town, you guys put out the colored containers out by the street where you come in here. And then what I had seen was they just have black garbage cans like we used to do in the old days before we had the lifts where you would buy a black can, and that's obviously, people throw their garbage in there, and then they have blue cans for recycling.

And it's it's really quite amazing to watch as people are walking by. If there's a garbage can, an open lid that doesn't designate what it's for, everything goes in that can. Whereas if you're specifically identifying the collection areas and where the stuff is supposed to go, at least says what goes in which one, I have seen that it's it's a tremendous difference. Yeah.

And so that's one of the reasons we wanna have these cans actually staffed at the home and garden show is to just, like, with citizens and be like, hey. Do you know what you're doing? And they're like, oh, or I don't care or or show me how to do this or that kind of thing. We wanna just we wanna kinda handle people for a little while. That way they in this event, will give us some feedback, direct very direct feedback about what we're up against. Because you have to consider that the this home and garden shows, that's that's that's basic. Like, wait wait till we get to the festivals and the drinking ones. Nobody drinks super hard at the well, some people do at

the home

and garden show. But, like, the fair, the the spectacular, those are way harder. So we're gonna start with the easy street and then go with box.

Yeah. But I I think the the idea that we had talked about in the past of getting those placards of what goes in these can like, I've seen, like, at at Serrano, like, for those events that they have, and you have the blue containers, and then you have the placket on there that shows exactly what goes into it. And Yeah. That really needs to go Mhmm. On the residential cans. Because I noticed on on yours here, you know, you're kinda concentrating, and I guess it's because of the regulations and the color coding. But it seems like it would be much more helpful instead of people remembering the color coding is to know what goes in each of those cans. Yeah. Because for instance, this is saying the recycling bin is blue. Now I have Yeah.

I I have I have five houses at my home, and four out of five are not blue. They're yellow. Yeah. So those don't have to be changed out until you call in and you have a bust container. So some of these might not be changed out because I think it's,

like, ten years. 2036. So Yeah. I would encourage them to change them out sooner.

Information. But now it on. Has yellow cans. Then it says blue. If you should put blue and yellow. Yeah. Yeah.

This time I mean, the yellow Yeah. The yellow the yellow ulcer is a issue.

So the the label done there completely We

didn't we a lot of that. We didn't, yeah, we didn't use to label. We weren't doing the in lid label on the yellow ones. We we've been doing it on the blues for going on in, like, a year and a half now or two years almost. Yeah. So, yeah, every container for all waste streams, trash, organics, and recycle, it all has the diagram on the lid. Yeah.

And that signage might be a thing that we that that's another thing that if we're at a public event, just because we get this this the coordinator on board and we get the food people on board, we might require signage on the recycling and fresh containers. We might have to so I don't wanna I don't wanna stick any of those public events with rules that they can't comply with or that are redundant until I actually see some throughout ourselves and and see what the problems are and actually listen to people and listen to vendors, everybody, all the stakeholders. So that's what we're gonna do this year. So we're working on

it. So

do we in terms of this item, do we have Any of the callers would like to comment, or we have the band ready.

SG already commented.

You wanna talk about anything?

Lot of time. Yeah. The jurisdictions pretty much covered it. We're excited about schools. I think there's an opportunity there. They could collect organics and and if done right at high volumes, which would be nice. Yeah. That's that's that's what it is. You know? Almost we'll we'll continue to help and grow there, but pretty much that. Yeah.

K. So maybe move this on to the next item, which is number six. And That's comments, and we wanted to get some input to verify. We are we've been doing Zoom calls every other week for an hour to get started on this, the five year review of the solid waste management plan. And Doug has developed this graph for showing basically everything for us.

Sure. And we had a couple where we had some questions and wanted some input from EDSWAP and maybe some clarification. The first was on I'm here on the short term strategies one to one. And that was to create a Westflow JPA authority. So this was a strategy which when this was first rolled out, basically, each of the jurisdictions that would be involved were asked if they would be interested in doing this, and they said no.

And so nothing happened, but there was a point saying, you know, that maybe we should go and check back with that again. So we were thinking that maybe representatives here might wanna go back and see if there is interest and let us know, maybe talk to your boards, and see if there would be interest. And if not, we would put that to bed.

Got a lot of new members from that era here. Again, the West Slope JPA would involve the CSDs, kind corporate area, City of Placerville, and allers to to function as essentially a JPA, which is you know, it's kind of a I would say it has a little bit more legal authority than someone like NSWAC does to do things and to work together. It was flatly rejected last time, meaning that nobody I don't believe any institution expressed interest in it. It's at the jurisdiction's discretion to to create a JPA if you want to.

K. Do you know why? They

I feel like I think my best guess, and I don't wanna pollute any kind of future vote on it, but my best guess was it was redundant. They felt like it wasn't really I mean, Eldorado Hills CSD has its own franchise agreement. We have our own franchise agreement. County Park has its own franchise agreement. I I feel like that everyone kinda felt like that they were comfy in their territory with their authority.

SB thirteen eighty three can change that a little bit, obviously, with coordination, but I still don't think there's enough with SB thirteen eighty three to justify I mean, we're coordinating on edible food recovery and certain other items, but there's not anything that the county is kinda, like, facing that's extra legal or anything, like, that would be difficult or potentially, you know, liability issues wise. It was just ridiculous.

So so what we're basically saying is if you would go back and just chat with your board and see if they would be interested in and let us know.

And research the you know, JPAs are have legal authorities. I would just research what they can and can't do and see if that fits your jurisdiction's interest.

So on 1.2, conduct the county waste characterization study. That has been done. It was quite a while ago. We didn't know if that's something that, should be part of this plan that we would be doing in the future. So we're kind of looking at, is it completed, or is it ongoing, or was it not feasible?

We do still refer back to the 2014 statewide release characterization study for a lot of our guidance documents because our. It's not necessarily because we think they have the best opinion about everything. It's more that they said, you know, everything we're finding in the drafts that shouldn't be in there is organics and C and D, so we're gonna pass a bunch of laws that say you have to manage organics C and D. It's kinda like what they decide they find, they act on. You know?

So we've been mostly playing kind of we were reactive to them versus doing our own waste characterization studies and saying, well, actually, we have this waste stream, so we're gonna deal with this thing. Our haulers are doing waste characterization studies. They're pulling loads as part of S P 1383 and checking things and whatnot. They they routinely do check their waste. And that's where I think and you've come to the same conclusion that we have or that the state did, which is a lot of the material that shouldn't be in there is organic waste and C and D.

Yeah. When we sort through the sort through the trash, which is quite nasty. Yeah. You know, it's it's gonna be yeah. I mean, there's a ton there's a I think there's there's quite a bit of C and D that ends up in the trash, largely in part because people that are doing those style projects don't wanna separate. They just wanna take one dumpster and put everything in. And, yeah, other stuff would

be recyclable. Since 2014, I think the things that we're seeing construction. 2014, I think the things that we and we don't even need a waste a formal waste characterization to really understand this, but the things that we're seeing in the waste stream in 2024 versus 2034 that are concerning are are batteries. Yeah. That's really the thing that's dramatically increased in cost, like, more in production.

There's more batteries, and more of them are going in the waste stream and causing more problems. So, I mean, I don't C and D and organics are just like they were ten years ago, but batteries is a problem and that we're trying to front run. And we don't I don't think we need a formal way of characterization to determine that. We get one with a firearm. They really they really make them. Yeah.

My sense is that we would say implementation's ongoing, you're doing the checks. You're kinda doing so that We're

really still working on the implementation studies that we have. And if anything, our our our data that

we have now is just And then maybe do we want to recharacterize it instead of conducting a county waste characterization study? It's just ongoing study of of waste, something like that.

Yeah. I mean, I think that item 1.2, when I read it, interpreted it, was like, do you wanna do a form of one? Yes. You wanna, you know, get the paperwork ready, and I just kinda like I I've I've not seen the last couple years, but it's something that needs to be on the table because, obviously, if a new material shows up and a merchant tech or something like that, then we need to talk about. I think one's worthy of doing when we have food when, you know, we transition to sustainable packaging.

That's definitely and I would think in the late twenty twenties, early twenty thirties, we really need to start looking at how much sustainable packaging is running trash and redo the study. But I also think the state would probably do that. There there are characterization studies. Probably need to I haven't heard any rumors that they're gonna do a new one, but they probably should. Been over ten years.

K. So a question on strategy two three, and that would expand these purchasing preferences practices.

Yes.

Has that been implemented?

Yes. The county revised its its its c p three, as I call it, or county crack whatever. That thing. It's always a mouthful. I can't remember. It was updated in 2019.

K. The next one would be strategy two point o three, enhance enhance home composting programs.

Sure.

So the question on that would be now that we have this organic selection, do we need to be enhancing home composting programs?

It's something we Julia, you're agreeing with me here. I'll so we can talk with I think we do. We we have stopped handing out compost bins at the county, not because we're discouraging home composting, but just because most people that wanted one got one. So we handed out several several 100 real lifetime program. So we're not doing any giveaways or anything with home composting. But anytime someone calls us with information about what do I do, we immediately refer them to Master Gardeners or talk shop with them about it. And so we're not discouraging.

Social media posts.

Yeah. We're gonna we've got a lot

going on, so keep forgetting all the stuff. Anyway Yeah. But we are gonna do monthly social media posts and encouraging. Yeah. Okay. So that would be implementation of BOPIS.

Yeah. The implementation of SB thirteen eighty three does not eliminate as a tool. Sorry.

No. No. You're right. As an alternative.

I would encourage them too. Yeah.

Yeah. Absolutely.

K. So the next one It's out of the waste. Question. That's the goal. Right? 2.17, advanced outreach and education programs, assuming that that is ongoing.

Yeah. We're doing that right now. K.

I would imagine if we needed to if you needed to get specific, you could probably talk about the brain program. Yeah.

So strategy 3.5 to develop two small volume rural transfer buyback facilities strategically placed to Reeboks in the West Slope. Both sides. So my understanding In addition. I've been on this forever is we spent a lot of time trying to get those, like, placed years back. And, basically, what we've heard from everybody is not here. So, yeah, they like the idea in the community, but would not get a agreement. This would be the site without getting pushed back from the neighbors.

So I'm I'm agree.

So is this something that we should be are we still working on, or is this not Well,

this is

so, again, forgive me because I don't have the whole one thing in front of me. It's about two small volume rural transfer buyback facilities. We do have transfer buyback facilities in the recycling centers. So you've got three. We've got three. The SGR's got one. I mean,

I wouldn't call it rural. Some apartments have transferred. Yeah. But

So do we need this?

Well, I don't if I remember reading it,

it it's not our current transfer station. We're trying to put satellite areas further out.

Was this specifically relating to collection, like, traditional waste collection, not a specific facility? I thought

so. Okay.

So I thought it was related

to green waste, I think. Just Yeah. Okay. Was the big one because that because most of the other stuff, there was a CRB on a lot of it. CRB. But, obviously, I if they had the space, they would wanna put the ones like the corridor. Yeah. Would have wanted to do that.

So semantics are important here. I'm sorry. I don't have it in front of me. But 3.5, if if it's In addition? If it's in addition, yeah, we have that, and we're doing that because we have recycling and buyback facilities that are open to the public that operate on the West Slope. If it's if it's what Mike was talking about, meaning, like, a free for all kind of remote site that would actually be a a remote site to the birth, that has been taped right now or not. We're currently not doing that. It's what you were referring to. Is that Okay.

So that would be is it infeasible, or is it tabled?

It's it's currently not feasible because the permitting left and the, you know, unfortunately, rampant would be. So it's not

it's not. But but, yeah, the buyback operating a buyback center is extremely challenging in its own right.

What was the notice that was given about security recently? Yeah.

So at a couple of our buy or redemption centers, buyback centers, we were still giving customers cash. Okay. So We're gonna move away from cash entirely.

People thought that you were handing out vouchers, which was like, we don't understand. I would

I would have been out of cash. We were doing vouchers at the the Placerville buyback center. And in Cameron Park and in Illinois, we were doing cash. Correct, Monica? And we're gonna move away from cash entirely. Yeah. And we're gonna move away from vouchers as well and just give people a hard check, predominantly safety related. And

I looked at doing it, like, an ATM. No. So at Schnaitzer's, which is now called something recycling, they have an ATM. It's probably operated by, like, some some national cash register company or one of

those companies that makes that kind of product.

And you you literally you they have a they give you a voucher, and you just go and you scan it.

And it it spits out the bills and the change, you're done.

Oh, it's like one of those it's like you see them in walls and public Yeah. They're like It's in a shack.

Yeah. It's in a shack. It's gotta have power. It's in a shack. Yep. And it it says press the button.

You push the button, and there's

a little barcode scanner, and you go, boop. And it goes, momento after it says the English part, and then the wire room's that part. And it spits out the money and then a little coin thing. You take your coin, you put

your money, and you put

your receipt away, you're done. Still doing the

cash, though. Yeah. It's just like ATM at the back. And when when you think Is that that's inside their facility? Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Terms of, like No. I don't

I don't know how, like, a

Security would be the main thing for us. I mean, as Tim said, we already have people who like to breathe in and steal trash. Yeah. I'd imagine an ATM would be quite attractive for the Just like getting out of ATM. Yeah.

Yeah. Mean, a lot of those just to give context, a lot of those are in secured facilities where you can't drop a card, though. Unfortunately, that's a common way of stealing these days. A bank robbery is just taking a stolen card and ramming in the ATM. So

Well, it's not I mean, it they they have

a gate just like the place does.

You would need you would need Well, it's smaller.

The other the other aspect, Mike, is that at the more at our more remote, like, Cameron Park and all the other hills, I mean, we we basically have one staff member running those Yes. Collect those redemption centers. And so should something happen, response time was low, and there's not You

guys redeemed at the Murph? No.

No. Like, if you brought in plastic bottles to the Murph, you can recycle them, but there's no that's not a that's not

a Interesting.

California CRV redemption center. Again, California Correct. Yeah.

You gotta

Five act centers are whole That's right.

Yeah. I need to We we got a few more questions. Okay. Just to clarify this one. So three point nine has developed a Westslope C and D processing facility. So we have expanded at the MERF, but our understanding goes this strategy was not selected for implementation. We don't have a separate. Is this something you're looking at?

We did at Wetzelovia, but now the site is not C and D processing. Correct. So it is we did temporarily to cover the MRF operations from, what, it was, like, 2018 to 2023 or something. Yeah. It was up for about five years, and we had a conditional use permit on that thing. But now it's gone. So currently, C and D is being processed at the MRF again. So there is no For the for the requirement. Yeah. For the requirement.

That covered under the 1.3. Yeah. So we never did implement 3.9. No.

And I don't think we're going.