At the June 7 meeting of the Archuleta Board of County Commissioners, Road and Bridge Manager Kevin Pogue — who recently assumed the duties of the County Solid Waste Department on top of his regular duties at Road and Bridge — was tasked with defending greatly increased fees for trash dumped at the County landfill on Trujillo Road. Some of the proposed fees, as presented at the hearing, were double the current fees. Other fees would have increased by about 50%. One minor fee — the $2 fee paid by residents for dropping off recycled materials at the Transfer Station — would be eliminated.
Mr. Pogue claimed that, even with the fee increases proposed, residents and businesses would still be paying less at the Archuleta County landfill than at other regional landfills. He did not specify which other landfills those might be.
The BOCC — Warren Brown, Alvin Schaaf and Ronnie Maez — did not approve the new, higher fees. Not yet.
During recent discussions about the numerous problems at the landfill, we were told that about half the waste dropped off annually at the landfill consists of construction and demolition debris.
The proposed fee increases for residential and business trash, as presented by Mr. Pogue, showed a 100% increase, from $17 a cubic yard up to $35, for compacted household waste. The proposed fees for construction and demolition debris showed relatively smaller percentage increases.
We’re listening, here, to Lars Schneider, co-owner of Mountain Men Disaster Mitigation, at the hearing:
“I don’t know where the numbers are coming from, that we’re still going to be paying less — at $32 a [cubic] yard? I actually just pulled up, just now, La Plata County’s website. They’re at $18 for construction debris, while their transfer stations are at $12 a cubic yard for household waste…
“And you can scroll down and see the same thing for the Bayfield transfer station. The landfill for residential waste… $14.10 a cubic yard. That’s on the website I just pulled up…
“I don’t know where you’re coming up with these astronomical numbers…”
We will note that the Bondad landfill serving Durango and Bayfield is privately owned and operated.
Actually, the astronomical numbers were apparently derived from a comparison with the Montezuma County landfill — which charges $54 per ton. But a ton is not the same as a cubic yard, and the comparison is not a simple matter. A cubic yard of gravel, for example, weighs about 1.5 tons. But a cubic yard of compacted household trash weighs between 0.3 and 0.2 tons, according to my online research. Which implies that, if Archuleta County were to adopt the fees suggested by Mr. Pogue, our households would be paying about twice as much per ton as any surrounding community. That is to say, about $100 per ton.
Mr. Schneider continued:
“We all know that businesses need to operate at a profit, but [the Bondad landfill] is a private business, and they are obviously operating at a profit.
“My business does disaster mitigation. Any time your house floods, we come in… and we’re doing at least a dump run every single week, year round, if not more than one. We’re paying $10,000 every single year, as is, doing one dump run a week.
“I don’t know where that money is going, but if a privately-owned business that can operate for just a couple of bucks more than Archuleta County, I don’t know why my dump trailer — I’m paying $180 per load — is going to become $360? Every single week? That’s $20,000, if I make one trip every week. But every one of these other landfills — Bayfield, La Plata, Bondad, all of them — they’re all charging just a couple of dollars more than us.
“This is a huge jump.”
Mr. Schneider acknowledged that the numerous problems at the Archuleta County landfill have resulted from policy decisions made by previous commissioners.
“But we should not be reacting to decades of neglect…”
The 2022 County budget assumes that our landfill will take in about $1.1 million in fees, annually. The year is nearly half over, so doubling the dumping fees, starting in July, might generate an additional $500,000? And maybe an additional $1.1 million next year?
How would those increased revenues be used to fix the many problems at the landfill? That question has not yet been answered. Although it has been asked.
Here is Mr. Schneider’s business partner, Bruce Jones:
“I guess what I’m getting to is, what’s our vision? What does Pagosa want to be? Your average house cost just went up well over 100%.
“If we don’t create a vision of what we want to become — not just for our landfill, but for our town — I’m telling you, you’re inviting the billionaires in here. And it’s not Durango that’s going to become the next Aspen or Vail. It’s going to be Pagosa Springs…
“What are we doing? I haven’t seen much change, in the past five years. I’m not trying to be mean. I’m just saying, if things have changed, it’s not been made publicly known…
“If it’s the people’s landfill, if it’s the people’s county, then how come a handful of people are making all the decisions?…”
Mr. Jones noted that he serves on the Pagosa Lakes Property Owners Association (PLPOA) board, and has seen the development of numerous subcommittees to assist with planning and policy development.
“You guys don’t have the time. I understand that. But you have willing people, throughout the community, who will help you discover that vision. It’s not about my vision, or Warren’s vision, or Alvin’s vision, or Ronnie’s vision. It’s about, where does the town as a whole want to go?”
If I were to judge the ‘vision’ embraced by the people who turned out at the BOCC meeting on June 7, and the people who turned out at the Town Council meeting later that same evening, and the people who turned out at the PAWSD board meeting on June 9…
…That is to say, if I were to judge by the people who are fired up and anxious about Pagosa Springs becoming Colorado’s next ‘millionaires- and billionaires- only’ resort community…
…I would have to summarize the message to our elected and appointed leaders with these simple words:
“Hit the brakes, guys.”
I happened to be sitting next to Road and Bridge Manager Kevin Pogue at the BOCC meeting, and directly in front of Bruce Jones, and I saw Mr. Jones tap Mr. Pogue on the shoulder, and suggest the creation of a citizens’ committee to explore solutions to the landfill fees and related issues.
A few minutes later, Mr. Pogue addressed the BOCC.
“Can I have the opportunity to meet with a handful of the trash service providers and people that are here? And we can re-evaluate where the community thinks we need to be? And we can revisit this?”
Commissioner Maez:
“We can table this [decision]. I’d love to.”
That remark elicited polite laughter and applause from the packed audience. Then the BOCC voted unanimously to table the solid waste fee increases to a future date.
“Right on. Let’s get busy,” suggested Commissioner Maez.