A new trailer, not like the old trailer

It looks like third time might be the charm for a new operations building at the Point Roberts dump.

As part of the 2020 supplemental budget Whatcom County Council will be asked to approve spending $75,000 in solid waste excise tax dollars to replace the circa-1961 trailer at the Johnson Road transfer station this year.

“We started this process a year and a half ago,” said Jeff Hegedus with the Whatcom County health department. He said the funding was approved for both 2018 and 2019 but hiccups in the procurement process and the challenges of transporting the new trailer through Canada delayed the project.

Hegedus said the new trailer will be 500 square feet to comply with the site’s conditional use permit, which is marginally smaller than the current 540 square-foot trailer that was installed by Point Roberts Recycling and Refuse, the previous tenant of the facility, without a permit. When that company’s lease was not renewed, the county paid to acquire the improvements they had made to the facility.

“It’s a refurbished trailer designed specifically for use at a transfer station,” Hegedus said of the new building. He added it was part of a larger plan to make improvements to the transfer station using solid waste excise tax dollars collected in Point Roberts and throughout the county.

Proponents of an independent solid waste district for Point Roberts have pointed to a lack of return for solid waste excise tax dollars collected here as a reason for a separate district that would keep those tax dollars on the Point.

David Gellatly, who owns Cando Recycling and Disposal, the company that currently leases the transfer station and provides curbside recycling and garbage pickup, said they expect minimal disruption. “We’re prepared and we have a plan that will see us closed Monday to Friday with only one dump day lost to the public,” he said. Asbestos abatement is required prior to the removal of the old trailer and site preparation is needed before the new trailer can go in.

Plastic bag recycling

In other garbage news, Gellatly said they were ramping up a new program to recycle plastic film and wanted to remind recycling customers that they need to put clean plastic film in a bag tied up “like a football” on top of their paper recycling bin.

“We can’t commingle it with the plastic bottles on the recycling truck so it’s being picked up in the tool bin of the garbage truck,” he said, which has led some people to think the film is just being put in the garbage, a perception compounded by the use of a large garbage can at the transfer station to store the collected plastic film.

“Absolutely not,” Gellatly said, adding these measures were temporary while they developed infrastructure to keep the plastic film clean and separated from other recycling streams.

The plastic film is taken to Merlin Plastics on Annacis Island in Canada. According to the company’s website, they recycle the film into plastic pellet and flake for reuse.

“Our high value, quality recycled plastic products are being integrated into various commercial and industrial industries as an alternative to virgin resin for manufacturers to produce similar or alternative consumer goods,” it states.