Evelyn Stover Recycling Center in Weiser set to close next week as nonprofit departs

The Evelyn Stover Recycling Center in Weiser will close next week when the nonprofit organization currently running the facility bows out on Sept. 26. 

 The recycling center has been managed by the Weiser River Resource Council since September of 2014, a total of four years this month.  

 WRRC volunteers stepped in to run the recycling operation after the local Kiwanis Club disbanded, which had operated the recycling center for years.

 As of Monday, WRRC officials said nothing had changed since they notified Washington County commissioners in July they were ending operations. 

 One WRRC member said Western Recycling, which owns the pallets, containers and cardboard baler at the recycling center, will pick up the items on Sept. 26. 

 The city owns the property the center sits on and a forklift. City officials have not publicly said what the property will be used for in the future, if it is no longer a recycling center. The county owns the canopy roof over the recyling center. 

 The WRRC cited a number of factors that led to the decision to end management of the center in a July 24 letter to county commissioners. 

 Finding volunteers to run the center has become difficult. The nonprofit was told it needed to provide workman’s comp for the volunteers who bale cardboard and do other work at the center. Prices received for recycled items were down and revenue had dropped.

 The recycling center accepted numerous items, including cardboard, magazines, paper, tin, aluminum cans and other recyclables for years and volunteers baled the cardboard and kept the center tidy. 

 Until January, the center had also been taking plastic bottles, but they were no longer accepted when the domestic market for plastic items all but disappeared.

 WRRC officials noted that everything that has been recycled through the Weiser center has saved the county money by not having to truck it to the Clay Peak Landfill in Payette County, where all of Washington County’s trash ends up

 In addition to saving the county the expense of having to truck the trash and pay dump fees at the landfill, the recycling has taken items out of the waste stream and saved space in the landfill.

 Figures supplied by the WRRC indicated a total of 582 tons, or 1.1 million pounds of recycled items were processed during the four years the organization operated the recycling center. The revenue from the aluminum, newspaper, cardboard, tin and other recycled items totaled about $30,000 over the four years.

 The county has been covering some of the monthly costs associated with operating the recycling center. The city agreed to spend up to $5,000 for a used forklift for the center.

 WRRC officials said running the recycling center was never an indefinite project for the organization when they took it over four years ago. 

 The WRRC has been in discussions with the county for the past couple of years to try to get a countywide recycling program going. 

 One year ago, the WRRC agreed to continue with management of the recycling center in Weiser through September of 2018.

 The agreement came with the expectation that a recycling program operated by Washington County would be funded for fiscal year 2019 starting on Oct. 1. That has not happened and to date neither the city or county has offered a recycling plan, WRRC officials said.

 A recycling task force created earlier this year has not come up with a plan for city and county recycling. 

 “It is important to note that the Evelyn Stover Recycling Center is not the WRRC Recycling Center. The center has from its inception been a Weiser and Washington County joint venture,” the letter to commissioners said.

 The WRRC said it will continue to work with the county and city in any way it can to get a viable recyling program for Washington County and the cities of Weiser, Midvale and Cambridge.