Recycling Program Suspended Indefinitely
The Bandera County Commissioner’s Court voted to postpone the county’s recycling program during their January 27 Regular Meeting.
Sheriff Dan Butts explained during a statement to the court the recycling initially stopped because of COVID-19, and he did not want to put his people out there until it had subsided.
“We were supposed to have volunteers for the recycling that would ensure that the people that dumped their recyclables were dumping the correct type in the correct bin and not put trash in there, said Butts. “People don’t want to pay to get rid of stuff, so they dump their trash in the recycling bin. We end up with trash in there, and that costs the county money to get rid of it.”
Butts added that the county was not turning a profit from the program.
“If you look at the time and the manpower and everything at the center, we are not making any money on the recycling. If we ever get to where we can put our people back out there to work without bringing a disease into the jail, I don’t know that it would be better spent putting them out on the road picking up trash. It would make people feel a whole lot better if they saw the inmates out there picking up the trash,” he said.
Commissioner Jody Rutherford said the reason they are not recycling now is due to the absence of volunteers.
“I’ve asked for volunteers. I’ve put it in the paper before, I’ve handed out flyers and I have no volunteers.”
County Judge Richard Evans asked if the county could make money selling the aluminum.
“No, that stuff is sky high right now, and cardboard is out of sight, plastic is out of sight.” said Rutherford.
Commissioner Bobby Harris said the issue was a double-edged sword
“If we don’t recycle, it’ll be on the side of the road, that’s a proven fact. If we do, we don’t make any money,” he said. “Right now, we don’t have any personnel in the budget to handle these bailers.”
Rutherford told the court they only need one person, two hours at a time to watch the bailer on Wednesdays and Saturdays.
“That’s all it takes.” said Rutherford. Harris acknowledged if they budgeted for a person to work there twice a week, it would have to come out of taxpayer money.
“And that is not right.” said Harris. The court discussed lending out the bailers to another county that was recycling, yet concluded it would be too burdensome to get them back should they ever bring back the recycling program. “Yeah, we have about $60,000 in bailers in Bandera County.” said Rutherford.
The commissioners were in agreement that they did not know how to move forward and voted all in favor to postpone the recycling programs indefinitely in Bandera County.
The Bandera County Commissioners’ Court meets the second and fourth Thursday of each month at 10:00 a.m. at the county courthouse. All meetings are open to the public and citizens are encouraged to attend.