Submitted by Bruce Dammeier, Executive.
Our colleagues in Planning & Public Works do a great job managing solid waste. And they just made a change that is a real win-win!
Now, anywhere in Pierce County, your food waste can be added to your yard waste bin (Or does your family call it a “cart”?) for composting. This change in how we handle food waste is beneficial for many reasons. First, it reduces the amount of garbage going into our landfill. Second, food waste rotting in a landfill creates methane gas which is bad for our environment. Instead, food waste composts well with our yard waste. And finally, this compost can be sold and end up in someone’s garden. From my count that is 4x “wins” – we avoid two bad things and replace them with two good things!
To learn more, I recently had the chance to tour the composting operations at the Purdy Transfer Station and was amazed at the work the team is doing. It’s really impressive – and quite warm! And I learned it was also the first in the world!
Take a look at this latest edition of Inside Pierce County and learn what all the steam is about:
My thanks to Kevin Green, Chris Brown and Ryan Dicks for the great tour and behind the scenes access to the compost operations. As they say, “if you can eat it, we can compost it!”
Before I close, I want to thank everyone who joined me this week in our latest Employee Town Hall. We had nearly 60 questions submitted in advance and I regret I couldn’t answer all of them. But please know that I read every one of them.
If you didn’t have the chance to join us live for the Town Hall, I invite you to grab your lunch and check out the replay here.
Have a great weekend, and thanks for reading.
