2004 ANNUAL REPORT

In 2004, the Board decided to designate Solid Waste Facilities that are allowed to accept District waste. Because the District is on the eastern border of the state, several haulers that operate in the District, dispose of District waste at out-of-state landfills. These out-of-state landfills are not required to pay the District's $2.50 generation fee, and the District was losing revenue.

The Board of Directors chose go through the designation process, which allows the District to designate in-state and out-of-state landfills and transfer facilities that can accept District waste. Undesignated facilities are prohibited from accepting District waste. Designation also allows the District to enter into agreements with these in-state and out-of-state facilities. Part of the agreement stipulates that these facilities will pay the District $3.50 per ton for all wastes collected within the District. The additional revenue will be used to implement additional recycling activities described in the Solid Waste Plan (see below).

The District has designated 14 landfills, five transfer facilities and one scrap tire monofill. Of the 20 designated facilities, four landfills and two transfer facilities are located outside of Ohio.

The Policy Committee adopted the District's draft Solid Waste Plan and sent it out to be ratified by the local legislative entities. The plan ratification period began on December 20, 2004 and will end on March 19, 2005. In addition to the largest municipality in each county and the Board of County Commissioners in each county, the District must show that townships and municipalities representing at least 60 percent of the District have approved the Plan. The Policy Committee passed a resolution to repeal the District's current $2.50 per ton Generation fee, because a $3.50 per ton contract fee has been established as part of the designation process. The Generation Fee repeal must also be ratified by the legislative authorities in the District.

The Ohio EPA has established several waste reduction goals that must be met in the District's Plan. The District chose to comply with the "Access Goal", which requires that the District provide access to at least 90 percent of the population in each county. Although the current drop-off sites in Carroll and Harrison county meet the access goal, the District will be required to add 12 new permanent drop-off sites in Columbiana County. The funding for these additional sites and converting the current mobile sites to permanent sites will come from the $3.50 per ton contract fee.

In early 2004, the District purchased some new CCTV equipment, including a color/black and white camera and a Video Disk Recorder (VDR). The high-resolution camera switches from color during the day to black and white at night or in low intensity light. The VDR records all video on a computer hard disk instead of a video tape. The VDR is set-up to record for about 15 days, after which the oldest video is overwritten with new video; this allows the recording process to be automated.

This equipment was installed in May 2004 at Mason Color in East Liverpool. Since then, several instances of dumping have been captured by the system. Although identification of the initial offenders was not possible, the number of instances of illegal dumping at the East Liverpool recycling site has decreased sharply. The use of the CCTV system, in conjunction with the diligence of East Liverpool officials, has had a positive effect on the recycling site.

The cost for conducting the District's annual collection of unwanted tires, electronics and scrap metal has gone down significantly from $16,662.69 in 2003 to $11,366.76 in 2004. The lower cost is mostly attributed to savings from more prudent advertising decisions and lower tonnage of tires. A total of 5,458 tires were collected in Columbiana County in 2004 compared to 7,048 tires in 2003. These totals includes tires collected in the City of East Liverpool. Harrison County noticed a decline from 2,722 tires in 2003 to 2,115 tires in 2004. Carroll County had 2,551 tires in 2004 compared to 2,870 tires collected in 2003.

Electronics tonnage jumped almost 70% from 17.40 tons in 2003 to over 25 tons in 2004 of used computers, printers, monitors, TVs, VCRs, etc. The collection of scrap metal increased in 2004 to 71.70 tons from 65.26 tons in 2003.

"This program consists of litter collection activities and community outreach," reports Mr. Lester Nabb, Program Manager.

The litter collection activities consist of road side cleanups. "We try to clean up a portion in each of the 15 townships, with a goal each year of covering approximately 200 miles. We collect an average of 4 to 5 bags of litter per mile." "Litter Crews" are made up of DJFS referrals and also young people from the transitional program from Harcatus C.A.O. Mr. Nabb also works with the Health Department and Sheriff's Departments on complaints of illegal dumping throughout the county.

Community outreach consists of educational programs, which are presented to the district's schools as they promote the importance of recycling and litter prevention for grades K-6th grade. Mr. Nabb also uses a "tin man" and a wooden duck as part of his presentations.

In July, the program mans a booth at the county fair to meet the public and give out program information. Mr. Nabb also does public speaking to different organizations throughout the county.

Carroll County Recycling & Litter Prevention implemented two activities during 2004 - Community Outreach and Litter Collection. Community Outreach (CO) included setting up booths and displays at community events and libraries together with participating in parades, thus reaching approximately 18,769 individuals. CO also included all presentations to classes and groups/businesses about recycling and litter prevention educating approximately 1,369 individuals. Sponsoring an open house in October, Program Manager Julie Hykes celebrated "Teaching 10 years of Recycling & Litter Prevention" .

The Litter Collection activity included a litter collection crew, supervised by Chuck Graber, collected 37.18 tons of roadside litter, illegally dumped couches, tires and general trash from 327 miles of roads from March through August. Included in the crew again this year was Dan "Butch" Lombardi, the 2002, 2003 and 2004 "Volunteer of the Year," who adopted his own area this year. The "Plant Pride. . .Not Litter" spring campaign netted 5,310 pounds of trash picked up by 85 volunteers. The Adopt-An-Area program is still going strong and has a total of 23 areas adopted by 18 groups covering 41.09 miles of county and township roadways.

"The Columbiana County Community Recycling and Litter Prevention Office utilizes a multi-faceted approach to educate the public about the importance of recycling and preventing litter", noted Cindy DePillo, County Director. Through Community Outreach Activities, 235+ programs were presented to more than 4,500 individuals in area schools, civic clubs, adult groups, churches and camps. Educational kits are available for check-out, or organizations can receive assistance in delivering programs related to athletic shoe recycling (NIKE), Earth Day, etc.

Community workers cleaned township and county roads, students recycled milk cartons and paper, and local youth organizations sponsor "recycling clean-up days". Volunteers have cleaned up the Ohio River for the 16th year in a row and assisted in cleaning up state and county parks.

Through the Buy-Recycled Activity in 2004, the Village of Leetonia received assistance in purchasing items for Wick Park, Cherry Valley Arboretum/Coke Ovens, Legion Ball Field and their administration building.