John Roosa, Administrator, Boone County Landfill and Boone County Recycling, June 03, 2026

joined today by the legendary John Rosa. Good morning, your goatness. Well, thanks for being here today. We had a busy, busy time. We're into the month of June and. Yeah, June, I know you're going. Well, the one thing I kept telling people is and I did it at the end of last week when they were all talking about free yard waste. And I'm going. Final days again, Saturday was the last day for it again. What we call free doesn't mean you still won't take yard waste. Right. There is a fee for it. And you still have hollers that they'll charge to take it. Yep. So it's still available. It's not like you can't get rid of it. It's just you get up on the scale and, you know, there's the fee attached to it. But yeah, it was a good spring. It was busy. There were still some challenges. There were still some that can't quite do it right. But that's ongoing. It seems like maybe it was better. I don't want to jinx it, but there seem to be less. But that's just going from perception, I guess. But that's just one of those things. And the other thing is, of course, we do have the household hazardous waste drop off. And again, in June, it is the first Saturday and it's on the road on the road. Yes. In June, we go on the road on the 6th. The Saturday, we are at Boone DMACC parking lot 9 to 11. Bring your household hazardous waste. And we're talking about materials that have some harmful value to it, I guess you might say, like oil based paint, not latex paint, paint thinners, chemicals, fertilizers, old gasoline could be brought in as well. Be ready to sacrifice your container that goes with it. We don't pour off on those. We discourage oil. There's other places in town that can accept that and use it for other purposes. Aerosol cans. Antifreeze. Antifreeze is a good one, yes. And then all those different types of cleaners that you might have, whether it's bleach, ammonia, not sure which it is and what it is. Don't mix them together to try to find out, please. But that's what we want to do is get it controlled and get it in its right spot. So the June 6th one, the first Saturday in June of Inudonus for many years, Metro comes up with their trailer so people can bring it right in town instead of having to come out to the landfill to drop it off. Pretty slick, pull up, bring your load up your goodies, drive up, take your turn, pull up onto the area, we'll take a little survey, you go to the tarp area, you can stay in your vehicle, just let the guys do the unloading, the workers do the unloading of the stuff that they can accept. If you're not sure, you can bring it along but just be prepared to be turned away. If you do have latex paint, you do get to keep that. That's garbage, it just needs to be dried and then it's regular garbage. We do that one on June 6th and then the other one that started up just a month ago or so. At their request, we'll point it, they made a contact with you. They did and it was something that was kind of, it was just a spurring on I guess maybe of it but I think years ago they did something in Ogden, it's not during my time at the landfill but many years ago they used to do that collection so they asked about adding it on, talked to Metro and they were able to schedule it in so it worked out really nice but that'll be June 8th and that's in the evening so it's a little odd time for us anyway. Usually we do them in the mornings but that's alright. So part of their citywide cleanup, June 8th from 5 to 7, still in the city park area. The plan, as I understand it, they do their own, they do their yard waste mulcher, there's some grinding there and then they also do the collection and then around the corner will be the Metro Park trailer, I'll be there, I'm planning to be there myself and some of our workers will be there too but you can bring in your solid or your hazardous waste to that area. If you have it all, that's great but you don't have to. If you don't have another garbage to throw away or no other clean up stuff to get rid of, you can do the household hazardous waste to drop off separately, it doesn't have to be. And because of the service area, anybody can come in, you don't necessarily have to be from Ogden. Yeah, yeah good, yeah the clean up area, same for this one on Saturday. So the clean up area for the Ogden one but the citywide cleanup portion of that, that's for residents of Ogden but the household hazardous waste, that could be anyone in our service area which is all of Boone County, a lot of Green County, some other cities as well but so if you're in the area and you're wondering if you can go to that one as well, can't make the Saturday one, you can drive on over to Ogden and join in on that one if you are in our service area. And you still have the regulars you've been doing again on the first Saturday, it just so happens this one's going to be on the road. So I got to ask the one, what about July? What are we doing on the 4th of July? What about July? Because I'm guessing you're closed that day. We sure are, yes. We are actually the landfill and recycling hours are short on Friday so we do our Saturday hours on Friday and then we have Saturday, we're closed, that's how the holiday schedule works out that time. So we're going to bump that to the next week so that'll be July 11th when we do our Saturday collection and then we'll turn around and get back on track in August, be August 1st for the household hazardous waste Saturday collection events at the landfill. And I know, I think it's online on the, probably on your website or the county website for the landfill. You might have a listing again of things that are appropriate for. I think it's radioactive, don't bring radioactive, there's some really strange ones. Explosives. Explosives, yeah. There are other ways to dispose of it. And an actual radioactive one is smoke detectors. Oh. That's fire alarm smoke detectors. Those have a small amount of radioactive waste. So we would think that those would be household hazardous waste but that's something they cannot deal with so actually those get landfilled unfortunately. Of course then they say, but don't bury too many of them at once. It's pretty vague. Take the batteries out too. Do take the batteries out but what is too many? It's pretty vague. Hopefully you don't have a collection of them in your basement, you know, been collecting in the neighborhood and looking to dispose of those but you know, if you have one or two you can certainly dispose of them in the landfill. Household hazardous waste, do you take the batteries then too? We do. Rechargeables. Yeah. Any of them honestly. Well you're taking all of them. We just do. Yeah. All batteries collected. So ABCs in case you're wondering which batteries, bring them all to us and we will do that at the collection events also that we referred to with Metro. They'll take a lot of the rechargeable ones. We'll bring the lines back and process them ourselves. So yeah, we just want to get them all out of there. Fires are a continual concern and a hazard so confusion about batteries, we want to just eliminate that so let us deal with it. Yeah. Okay. There we go. Now you folks know you got the whole story there. Now the other party is, especially during the summertime people, and again with people buying houses, moving and doing cleaning things out. I'm guessing occasionally you're getting calls and appointments, I've got things I need to bring out. Yeah. Yeah, that's always one that's like, how much stuff are they going to bring in too? Because yeah, there's a lot of surprises in those situations. Estate cleanups are always a challenge when relatives, family members, moms and dads pass away and you're left with all the stuff left over in your home. And you look in that garage and go, where is this and how long has it been here? You just cringe and then there's the unidentified, unlabeled containers of some random liquid and what do you do with those and usually we can help process those. The goal with the household hazardous waste program is to take as much as we can. And if we can't take it, then we're going to try to help you get an answer to where it should go. So we do our best not to just say, well, it's yours, tough to deal with it. Good luck. We'll try what we can. We want to take what we can. So we'll define for options. Yeah. Right. Again, now we talk household, so again, we're not talking your farm chemical containers and things like that. Of course, most of those people are certified. They know how to handle them and what to do and they don't waste a lot. No. They use it up, but getting rid of containers and things like that, there are ways to do that. And if you ever have questions, you know, the best is we'll get it started and just call us at the landfill. We'll try to answer your questions and if we can't, we'll seek out the answers and get back to you. But we've experienced a lot of it and not saying we know it all. There's always those surprises that kind of catch us off guard, but we'll do our best to get you an answer as quick as we can and get back to you soon because we don't want it just to be dumped down any waterways, sewers, any of that stuff, not in your yard. So we want to be able to take what we can. So give us a chance, let us help you out to 515-433-0591. Check us out on the website too. There's a lot of information there. All right. Well, okay. That takes care of that. So we'll get that part. No, I was going to say because, again, I see a lot of people with house sales going on, people cleaning up and getting that out. And I'm pretty sure that, yeah, you still have the appointment time going on. So we'll have July on the 11th and then back to the beginning of August, 1st of August. But then after that, what, October we go Madrid, right? Yep. September we'll be at the landfill too. October 3rd, down in Madrid, and then one more in November at the landfill on the first weekend and then shut her down for the winter time. It's hard to think about already. I know. That's the steamboat winter. Well, and again, I can remember, I remember many, a few years ago when a lot of the household hazardous things started, you know, and someone would come in with, you know, a barrel of arsenic if you know our stuff. This was in the basement and, okay, I mean, you know, there were a lot of different things like that that were showing up, but it got ridden a lot over the years. So that's good. Yeah. All right. Let's talk about some of the things going on in the landfill. I do know, again, WHKS working with you on your forest main project. So they're getting that lined up. We also know that we've got the next phase that's going to be going on there. So some prep work going on. What's happening on the capital project side? Yeah, they're going to be overlapping eventually. Right now, the WHKS slash JB Holland construction work for the forest main project, they actually started mobilizing. So a lot of stuff has been showing up at our site getting dropped off. So they are, they're not using it yet, but they're getting everything lined up. And so they'll be getting after it here probably next week. I would presume they're, I know they're off site for a couple of days on another job and then they're coming back probably with more equipment and getting set up. So yeah, hopefully they're rocking and rolling all June, whether dependent, whether permitting of what they're able to do. So the goal is to get their portion of the work in the landfill itself and at the bottom of the landfill, get that pumping system in place and set up and out of the way. So that way the next project with the cell phase nine are from HLW engineering design that for us and Leroy and Sons is the company that's doing the work. Get them in there and then they can start doing their work in the cell itself. So the goal is both of those projects will be completed by the end of the calendar year. So a lot of stuff going on, fingers crossed, but the big one, if they get the initial piping and stuff in for pumping, that, that needs to be done before the site can be prepped for solid waste. Yeah. You got to have the, I mean, that's kind of what we've been doing over the last several sites. You've got the liner in there and everything else and, and so that allows that leachate to drain off. Right. This is all part of it. Yep. That's right. Try to get that base done first. Yes. Yep. So yeah. Go from there. There'll be a lot of stuff going on for sure with that and it'll, it'll be coming up. So we're bracing ourselves and getting ready for it. Well we've had some clean up things going on. Some of the roads and things like that get obviously as the part of keep boom counting beautiful. Like that. Yeah. People to sign up for those areas. Still getting some illegal dumping happening out there, but occasionally they, someone dumps something and they go and check on it and some, you know, they almost, one of those that dump some furniture in the dish, I think they almost beat them, beat them back home there. Yeah. So again, that's one of those things I know either the county sanitarian or you've got the sheriffs department and people need to know that if it's dumped there and you can't identify it, it's going to cause, I mean, it's costing taxpayers because secondary roads picks it up. They haul it in. You don't really charge him. Right. And, and yet we got to cover the cost of bearing it all. Right. There's still, yeah, the taxpayer impact, you know, is at the landfill. We don't charge, you know, we don't charge the secondary roads. We're not tax based, I guess at the landfill, but we make our own, but we have to eat that cost that's eaten up our space at no charge and there's an expense that we absorb. But you know, the, the taxpayer side of things, the secondary roads or whoever, the sheriffs department going out, as you said, the sanitarian to review it and see if they can find who did it. Those types of things, you know, those that cost money and, you know, that's an impact directly to it. We have, you know, time and labor and hopefully no one gets hurt in the process of having to deal with those things, the fuel, et cetera, to haul that. And so, yeah, you know, our rates are still pretty reasonable. They're going up here July 1, but still keeping it pretty darn reasonable overall. There's, just get it to the landfill and get it to the right spot. I would also, you know, as far as other types of disposal of stuff while, while I'm on it, instead of just dumping it to what else could you do with it and hopefully don't people don't resort to burning those things because that certainly also is that's in my mind is just another form of illegal dumping. It's not getting dumped, but it's being illegally disposed of because what happens with burning a mattress or whatever else might get dumped is there's toxics being released in the environment. So backyard burning, you know, is always a concern. If you're having a bonfire, you know, a campfire type thing where you're burning wood that was from your property, no worries. But along, along with not getting into burning other things while the fire is going, let's throw tires and let's throw a mattress and a couch and whatever else on there. Those are, that's harmful and he's any color, any smoke of color being released in the environment is bad too. So I had those discussions that the county is as far as getting that message out there to us. Well, that's one of the things too, and DNR, not a fan of that, even though sometimes some of their burns, you kind of wonder. You know, you look at like prairie burns or CRP fields burned, we had to do mine. You know, it looks kind of grayish in color when the smoke's going up and you know, some of it's the natural environment, I guess. You know, is that a problem? You know, no, generally not, but I mean, it still has a smoky grayish color. But so definition of smoke of color is, you know, is tough when you see the big black billowing smoke, that's not anything that was naturally grown on your property. That's illegal stuff. So please be aware that doesn't, it's not like, I own my property, I can burn whatever I want because it's not just about the fire that's on your property, it's what's being released into the air, which is everybody's problem at that point. And I know in the rural part of the county, DNR has, I mean, they seek permits, I think, for some of those things that need to be, Al, it's just, I know the supervisors had asked questions about it and DNR came back with some of those answers. So caution when you're doing some of that. Be careful with it. Yeah. And if it went in doubt and if we can, you know, answer any questions with that, we can answer what we can. And if not, we can refer you to DNR and get answers and stuff for you of how to properly dispose of it. But generally, you know, if you're unsure, when in doubt, I guess throw it out would be the main thing. Don't throw in the ditches. Bring it out to the landfill is the throw it out portion. Quickly, I want to hit on the batteries because you have your secure battery location at the landfill. And have you been, people been coming out? Have they been bringing the batteries? I mean, I know sometimes it gets to be a real pain, but at least they're keeping them out of the land. Right. Yeah. That's the big goal for you. Yeah. It certainly is not a parade of vehicles coming out to drop off a battery. There are a lot of folks that just come out with batteries, you know, and it's a pile of them and we're able to, you know, at least store them appropriately. But yeah, we have a concrete building nearby the office. It's a ways away to safe distance away anyway. So if you have those batteries that are real problem, talking about those lithium, lithium ions rechargeables, if they're compromised in any way, bulging old cell phones for that matter, you know, that type of a thing. Our concern is get them out of your house. We want you safe at fire. You want to limit the fires. We want to limit fires at the landfill, but we certainly also want to limit them at your homes. So get them out of your home, not saying just throw them in your garage. That's not helping either. But bring them out to the landfill. We can store them appropriately before we can pass them along to somebody else that can dispose of them finally with them. And we do have companies that are doing it. Yeah. Yep. There's still stuff that can be done. You know, it's not just, it's doomed with, but you get those bulging battery packs and if they're, especially if they're warm, deal with it immediately. Don't wait. That's a little bit of a danger. Yes. Recycling activities going on. Again, people still, are they following the rules? Yeah. I know, again, you're still working with the site up there at Coase. Yeah. It's, it'll be ongoing. You know, we're at that point, the residents do a pretty good job, you know, a really good job, frankly. But are they doing it perfectly? No. I mean, it just takes a few to do it wrong that really impacts everything. So a hundred percent, you know, is it a, is it achievable? I don't know. I think that's a goal we work towards, but is it attainable? I'm not really sure if that's actual, but you know, we've got to keep trying and we got to keep the effort. So I will say that I'm, I'm noticing more and more breaking down boxes anyway. Yeah. So some of those things are, your roll-offs are pretty full of crushed or flat cardboard anyway. Occasionally someone leaves the other one, oh, with all the styrofoam packing. You know, it happens. Report I know you're going to give to the supervisors today, kind of mid-year. So what does this report all about? Just a department update, kind of mainly about the construction projects and how they're going. You know, we're wrapping up the fiscal year also and looking at what we're doing for the next, yeah, next full 12 months, I guess, for the next fiscal year, some of the projects that are just kicking off. I do have another one to discuss about getting it going, a remodel project, yeah, just some general updates and some calendar information too. I'd like to convey that because they'll get that information spread out through social media. And, and as you mentioned, rates are going up the 1st of July, yeah, and still relatively low for the overall, in the overall plan, again, what other landfills are doing, still relatively low, but I know some adjustments coming from some of the haulers already. So yeah, about to cover that cost. They do, yep. That and it's a little more expensive to fuel a truck now. So yeah, it's expensive to fuel a compactor and which we're on the docket to buy a new one coming up this year also. So fuel efficiency, yeah, that's right. John Rosaland, field administrator, recycling coordinator for Boone County, our guest on our program today. Thanks so much for joining us. Thank you.