Agenda - 12-06-2010 - 7c - Laserfiche WebLink

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centers,we question the priorities and do not believe the proposed spending will improve service or recycling. The plan raises fmancing, design, safety, location and funding issues as critical. There is no evidence that these issues exists although they appear to be the basis to justify the $2.5 million in convenience center improvements and new fees that the County can't afford especially when there isn't enough money for critical services likes schools and ambulances. Our convenience centers are busy places and with reduced hours they are crowded especially on Saturdays. While they may reduce hauling costs the overall economic benefit to the County or convenience benefits for citizens is questionable for the compactors especially because they are so heavily used. We fear that replacing 20 bins with two trash compacts at Walnut Grove and Eubanks will cause delays and traffic problems for everyone. Residents are concerned the compactors will reduce the safety of the centers especially for children who often help. Given that the County can't afford the convenience center improvements and the improvements are questionable please consider leasing one or two compactors to test their economic benefit and utility. Proposed improvements like composting and vegetable oil and others are great ideas and should improve recycling and should be inexpensive to implement;more education would help too. There is too little discussion of this in the plan for convenience centers. For convenience centers we support a long-term strategy that starts with a return to expanded hours rather than pursing a multi-million dollar upgrade we ask that you begin a pilot compactor program to determine whether they will work for Orange County. In the meantime please proceed with simple and inexpensive service improvements for recycling such as composting which benefits town users as well. I can't reconcile in my head that we don't have the budget to keep the centers open but we are going to get more money to fix them up. Tish Galu: I am here to talk about one of the statements that Steve made about education to be an important part of the plan as you go forward. We applaud the community and the board on the 54%recycling and believe even more recycling and composting can take place throughout the county if we increase educating our churches, large institutions and our school children and staff on how, when and why we recycle. With the help of the Orange County recycling we have new recycling bins for paper, bottles and cans and composting bins for the new parish ha11 and kitchen. We are beginning an educational program for parishioners and have a program of recycling in the school. We are integrating that with our garden program. Perhaps the program at St. Thomas Moore School for recycling and composting can be a pilot program on a county-wide basis. It doesn't cost a lot of money and it targets institutions who have traditionally been large trash producers. The number of activities that occur at churches can include hundreds of people. When we have an activity it can involve 300-600 people. Continued education of the members of our community will help meet and even exceed the goal of 61% in recycling and in particular we get our future generations to think about the three Rs— reduce, reuse, recycle. Once you get in the habit of recycling, composting and conservation it becomes an everyday event and that is what we are hoping to do. Programs like this can offer the greatest opportunity for improvement and could be expanded county-wide through groups like Justice United, Orange Congregation and Missions and Orange County Voice. 64