New DPW chief looks into compost, more volunteers
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| Rich Nota is enjoying settling in. (Photos by Lisa Aciukewicz) |
Rich Nota has been on the job as head of the Harvard Department of Public Works for almost a year now. Before he came to Harvard, he spent 10 years working for the town of Weston. He was hired there to organize and run the town’s first Public Works Department as director of the transfer station. During his time there, he said, he improved handling of recycled materials and put in compactors, which reduced costs to the town. He also added a waste and brush drop-off facility at the transfer station for yard waste, which eliminated the need for staff at a separate facility and allowed residents to make use of a “one-stop system.”
In a recent interview about the recycling program, he shared some of what he hopes to accomplish for the town. He’s spent these last months becoming acquainted with Harvard, he said, and has a very positive outlook for the future of the transfer station, including increasing the town’s recycling rate, creating a compost area, making the take-it-or-leave-it area more user friendly, re-energizing volunteers, taking advantage of area programs, and educating the public about recycling.
In Weston, Nota established a composting facility and would like to see that created in Harvard as well. It’s a three-year process that he sees as a resource for the town to use in town projects, and for residents, who would have access to the material at no cost.
He also thinks that the take-it-or-leave-it area can be improved. Ideally, the area would be covered or weatherized so that items need not be disposed of daily. With a volunteer present to advise people as to what is likely to be scooped up, it can be a more useful resource, he said.
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| Ralph Goodell and Mhairi Paget sort plastic as volunteers in the recycling center at the transfer station. (Photo by Lisa Acuikewicz) |
Raising the recycling rating
The main idea behind recycling, Nota said, is to remove municipal solid waste from the waste stream. He added that by diverting waste through recycling and composting, the lives of landfills can be extended, decreases are achieved in air pollution from trash incinerators, and there is less need for new disposal facilities. As communities embrace a commitment to reduce, to reuse, and to recycle, natural resources such as land, air, and water are protected and preserved.
Harvard now has a recycle rate of 25 percent (600 tons), although not too many years ago the recycle rate was 30 to 35 percent. Nota would like to see the recycle rate rise to 40 percent in the future. Currently, 2,400 tons of material is dropped at the transfer station, 75 percent of which is solid waste, which costs the town $100 per ton to remove—$180,000 annually. A 40 percent recycling rate would increase the amount of recycled material from 600 to 960 tons and reduce the remaining 75 percent of waste from 1,800 tons to 1,440, a savings of $36,000.
Harvard has benefited in the past from the work of a recycling committee composed of townspeople, but the last few years have seen a decline in participation, not only on the committee, but in the number of volunteers. Currently, the committee consists of just one person, and the volunteer force has dropped from about 100 people to 15.
Chris Ryan is the town’s recycling committee. He has been involved in Harvard’s recycling program since 1989, the year it was created, and he is the sole remaining member of the committee. With the reduced number of volunteers, he sometimes struggles to fill empty spots because the volunteers already do so much. He said that he is concerned that, as people inevitably retire, there will be a significant void.
Ryan said that he feels there’s potential in revisiting some options that were considered and dismissed before. For example, at one time, the committee wanted to adopt the “pay as you throw” method, a system where those who produce more trash pay more compared to those who produce less. It’s equivalent to putting a price tag on each container of trash that is taken to the transfer station for disposal. At the time, however, Harvard’s selectmen felt there wasn’t enough evidence or data to prove it would have the desired effect. “Maybe that’s now changed and would be worth looking into,” Ryan said.
Rebuilding the recycling committee and bolstering the volunteer corps is another of Nota’s goals. He believes that heightened awareness and an infusion of new energy and ideas will benefit the town greatly. He could then work with the committee on ideas and prioritization. He thinks they could be instrumental in coming up with ideas to encourage more people to use the recycling program.
Harry Jacobson and Mhairi Paget have been volunteering together at the recycling center for 10 or 12 years. They commented that there are very few new people and that volunteers are all about their age, in their 50s and 60s.
One of the biggest reasons they continue to volunteer is that it is one of the few remaining places in town to meet people. And it’s something Jacobson feels is his personal contribution to the town. Paget concurs, “If you don’t have time to commit to something like the Finance Committee, this is a good alternative.”
By 8:30 a.m. on a typical day, they have already filled three 30-gallon bags with no-deposit water and juice bottles. They wondered, jokingly, if the money spent on bottles of water that are dropped at the center could close the budget gap. And they noted that a good deal of the commercially bottled water comes from Ayer’s water supply.
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| Phil Batten overseas operations at the transfer station on a recent Saturday morning. |
They expressed surprise that with all the present-day consciousness surrounding conservation, some people seem to pay little attention to their own personal impact. Paget has seen whole loads of cardboard, already flattened, thrown into the dumpster by residents who could have recycled it by putting it in the compactor.
Incidentally, if recycled items are incorrectly binned, the entire container can be contaminated. One of the 40-yard containers of glass, for example, weighs approximately 10 tons, which costs the town $25 per ton to remove.
Paget and Jacobson said that they hope people will remember that volunteers at the center perform a valuable service and will get involved.
Harvard cooperates with surrounding towns in several ways, one of which is hazardous waste collection. Harvard is funded to host this collection every other year, and this year is Harvard’s turn. But, Nota said, Harvard residents can take their hazardous waste to any of the other towns during off years. The Devens Public Works Department will hold its collection May 5, or residents can wait until early June for Harvard’s. No date has been set, but will be shortly, Nota said.
Another area for cooperation exists in pursuing grant opportunities, which Nota said he intends to take full advantage of. Harvard is part of the North Central Regional Solid Waste Cooperative, which comprises 10 communities in the area. The director of the cooperative is instrumental in bringing funding and grant opportunities to the attention of its members. Often towns submit grant requests together, which can give all the communities a better chance of receiving funding.
Nota also explained his goal of reducing the fleet of vehicles that Harvard now uses. His goal is to equip the DPW with vehicles that will be used year-round. Currently, just one-third of the fleet is used in the winter months. He wants to make the equipment as multifunctional as possible, thereby reducing the size of the fleet and the capital expense to the town. The request for funding the purchase of a multipurpose heavy-duty dump truck, which will be presented at Town Meeting, has been made with this goal in mind.