What on earth…: The evolution of how Becker County has handled its trash – Detroit Lakes Online

Up until then, anything went. Barrels of arsenic were accepted as a revenue source and thrown in local dumps along with everything else. Old-timers have fond memories of shooting rats at those township dumps, or hunting for antique bottles in rural dumpsites.

Up through the 1960s, rivers that ran through major cities were so polluted with oil and other industrial waste that they regularly caught fire.

The Potomac, as Time Magazine noted at the time, left Washington "stinking from the 240 million gallons of wastes that are flushed into it daily" while "Omaha's meatpackers fill the Missouri River with animal grease balls as big as oranges."

The Cuyahoga River, which famously burst into flames in Cleveland in 1969, was the last American river to catch fire. It was so saturated with sewage and industrial waste that there was no visible sign of any kind of life, and it "oozes rather than flows," Time reported.

Saturday, April 22 is Earth Day, so now is a good time to take a look at where Becker County has been and where it's headed when it comes to getting rid of its garbage.

The ill-fated Becker County Sanitary Landfill was permitted by the MPCA 1972. Cars could dump for 50 cents, pickup trucks were charged $1. Larger trucks were charged more, up to $15 for a semi-load.

But times have definitely changed.

"It's not a dump anymorewe recycle so much out there," said Sandy Gunderson, who (among other things) handles household hazardous waste for the county.

"And of the waste we do send out," added Steve Skoog, director of Becker County's Land Use Department, "75 to 80 percent of it is burned for energy and to reduce its toxicity."

The county landfill had to close in 1991 due to groundwater contamination. It was placed on Minnesota's Superfund cleanup list in 1994.

Rural dumps were closed in 1975, and the county launched its first recycling program with 47 rural sheds in 1987.

The county transfer station was built in 1988, with waste going to the Perham incinerator. In 1993 Becker County waste started going to the Fargo landfill.

Tires were banned from landfills in 1985, major appliances were banned from the waste stream in 1990, yard waste was banned in 1992, fluorescent bulbs were banned from landfilling in 1995, lead batteries were banned in 1998, waste oil and filters were banned in 1999 and all are now handled as separate waste.

At the same time, other material began being accepted by the countyit started recycling concrete in 2005 and began recycling electronic waste in 2007. It recycles asphalt shingles. It had started its household hazardous waste program in 1990, built a new facility for it in 1998, and in 2009 started taking waste pesticides along with household products.

In 2011, recycling kicked into a higher gear when the rural sheds were replaced with 250 10-cubic-yard blue recycling dumpsters. The next year the county recycling program was expanded to businesses.

Along the way recycling programs were started for pharmaceuticals (there's a safe box at the sheriff's office at the courthouse), for household batteries, and and to serve businesses that generate small amounts of hazardous waste.

In 2011 Becker County joined Otter Tail, Todd and Wadena counties in a joint powers agreement to send much of its waste stream to the revamped Perham Resource Recovery facility, which sorts out recyclables and burns garbage (cleanly) to create steam, which is sold to power Perham businesses.

With the help of state bonding money, Becker County built a new transfer station last year, and aims to build a new recycling center at the same site this year. It will go hand-in-glove with the new mixed-recyclable residential curbside pickup program that will start this summer in Detroit Lakes, Frazee, Lake Park and Audubon. White Earth is also participating through mixed-recyclable community dumpster sites.

The new program will accept plastics, metal cans, cardboard, paper andthis is new --cartons, such as milk, soup or juice cartons.

Because broken glass can contaminate cardboard and paper, people will be asked to keep glass bottles out of the mixed recyclable stream, and to continue recycling glass in the big blue dumpsters at the 49 community recycling sites across the county (five sites are in Detroit Lakes) which will all remain open, Skoog said.

The county has ordered 5,592 bins, mostly 95 gallon, but also some 65 gallon and smaller, that waste haulers will distribute to their customers in the cities that are participating in the mixed-recyclables curbside program.

There is no tipping fee for recyclables, and they are not subject to the 18 percent solid waste tax, so residents should not see any increase in their garbage rates, Skoog said.

"We're hoping to see a big jump (in recycling) Gunderson said.

"The volume of commodities (recyclables) shipped out of our transfer station has really changed in the last 3-5 years," added Skoog. "More commodities, less loads of garbage."

It's not just the regular commodities that county acceptsplastics, metals, glass, cardboard and paper, Gunderson said, it's also the special wastetires, scrap iron, appliances, waste oil"years ago it all went into the dump. It's not a dump anymore."

With a demolition landfill, household hazardous waste site, transfer station and recycling center "we're an all-stop shop," Gunderson said. "When you look back at the 1970s, we've come along way."

"The waste has changed," Skoog added, "but the way we handle that waste has changed, too."

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What on earth...: The evolution of how Becker County has handled its trash - Detroit Lakes Online