Allen County’s landfill will benefit from dirt being removed to accommodate construction of the new county hospital along North Kentucky Street.
Bill King, director of Public Works, told commissioners Tuesday morning the contractor restructuring the site had offered the dirt.
“We sure can use it, both topsoil and other (less fertile) dirt, at the landfill,” King said, which prompted him to dispatch a loader and trucks to haul the dirt to the county’s landfill a mile southeast of LaHarpe.
Since the dirt is be free for the taking others also are digging in, King said. Technically the dirt is Allen County’s, since it purchased the hospital site.
Transporting the dirt to the landfill, a drive of between 7 and 8 miles, is a savings for the county, King reckoned. Dirt accumulated for use in covering trash compacted at the landfill and then for final cover comes from cleaning of road ditches throughout the county.
“If the landowner doesn’t have a need for the dirt we remove from ditches, we haul it back to the landfill, which can be 10 to 15 miles,” he said. “This was a good opportunity to load up our stockpile and do it at with a relatively short drive for our trucks.”
The contractor, Noble Construction, LaCygne, has no stake in who takes the dirt, King continued.
“He’s being paid to remove dirt and get the site ready for construction, that’s all,” King said.
Commissioners also held a hearing on the county’s solid waste management plan, required every five years by the Kansas Department of Health and Environment.
The plan, a document of about two inches thickness, sets out protocols for landfill operation, including countywide collection of solid waste and its disposal.
Allen County has had its sub-title D landfill, which requires compaction and daily cover of trash as well as measures to make it safe and reliable, since 1995.
King said he often had thought about more recycling, but had been stymied by lack of markets and enabling costs that exceeded potential income.
Newspapers and magazines are recycled through the Iola Rotary Club’s periodic drives, as is metal in appliances and other large things through Ray’s Metal Depot in LaHarpe. Waste oil and tires also are recycled through vendors that have arrangements with the county.
Daily disposal of about 100 tons of trash is needed to maintain the operation’s financial integrity, a level that has not been difficult to achieve, King said.
LOREN KORTE, whose Personal Service Insurance is the county’s carrier, said the county’s workers’ compensation numbers had increased of late, with most of the claims being in the ambulance department.
Korte said personnel in the department might not be as “physically fit as they should be,” and suggested an employee health and physical fitness program might help.