2025 a little after 2:00 p.m. Uh if you'd like to do a roll call. All right. Uh Chair Bre here. Uh Vice Chair Thomas Bradford here. Russ Redmond. Wade Chance
here. Joe Linta here. Michelle Shrauss here. Drew Enriquez nailed it. Yeah. Here.
Okay. Um, any modifications to the agenda as written? U, I'd like to let you know that under uh any other matters? I had two items I want to bring up. One pertains to uh
section 78-395 of the code and the other is the recently proposed rightway standards for the village of Tquest. Okay.
Could you uh make a motion to include that in the agenda, please? Uh I make a motion to approve the agenda as submitted with the addition of the items just mentioned or uh under any other matters. I second that.
All those in favor? I. Nays. Motion carries. Uh communications from citizens. If you could um just introduce yourself. Um my name is Marissa Perry. I live in
the country club. Um, and first I wanted to thank you all for your work on the EAC. Um, I'm an alternate on another village board and I know you put in a good deal a great deal of time here and work and I appreciate what you do. Um, I wanted to let you know that at the council workshop last week, the public
works director presented a plan to fundamentally alter in the most ecologically devastating of ways the village's current approach to swelles and right ofways. This plan was mentioned to you previously by the utilities director at your May meeting. I do not believe that you have been consulted on it since even though it is
already in code text form. So I wanted to walk you through a small number of the major problems this proposal poses to the village's ability to infiltrate storm water, mitigate flooding, and preserve the health of of our critical natural resources like the river and street trees, as well as the detrimental
effects it will have on the utilities and infrastructure projects it claims it will protect. Since at least 2019, the village's policy and code on swailes and rightways has been excellent. It encourages the use of low impact design principles such as bioailes and other creative storm water management
techniques in the swailes. It also expressly allows trees and shrubs in the right ofways and swailes. Our comprehensive plan promotes the village street trees as essential infrastructure and the landscaping code requires Florida friendly landscaping in most areas. These laws are all based on the
best current professional practices and have yielded excellent results here. The new proposal would reverse all of that in favor of a mostly barren sodon only swailes. In if enforced as written, the result would be total homogenization of the village to all sod street frontage
in front of homes and businesses. The proposal includes an extremely restrictive approved plant list of wild flowers and small grasses that homeowners will never include in their landscape landscape plans because the installation and maintenance requirements are extremely ownorous and the potential penalties for a misstep in
this proposal are so harsh. I won't enumerate all of the proposed penalties, but the directors presented a punitive scheme that includes permitting the village staff to rip out beneficial existing plants and trees with no notice. Fines are mentioned on nearly every page of the proposed ordinance
text. ordinance text and that is highly indicative of the purpose here. It is not meant to help residents better understand how to protect the storm water system or underground utilities but to punish them for not choosing a sod only right ofway. This proposal is regrettably and in contrast to an
overwhelming amount of professional and academic research exactly as it was described to you in May. At that meeting the director said that quote from a purely engineering design standpoint the swailes are swailes. I don't want anything in the swelles. End quote. This proposal would preclude residents from
attempting to prevent storm water damage to their own properties and their neighbors by following the best biosphil practices widely espoused by professionals for storm water mitigation. It is in short a huge step backwards and a complete reversal of many of the policies and programs that your committee has spent years helping
to implement and that most residents desire. Even as regards underground pipes, the premise of the proposal is deeply flawed. Sacrificing trees, shrubs, and biosphils everywhere to protect new pipes that, if properly installed, are simply not at risk of root intrusion is a poor strategy. We
should not denude the village of privately planted trees and shrubs that not only pose little threat to pipes, but provide huge benefits in managing storm water. I don't want to exceed my my time by a lot. Um, but I would be happy to explain how exactly the law
works and why it isn't necessary and is actually detrimental to its stated purpose of protecting the storm water system or underground pipes if you'd like to contact me later. Um, but I highly encourage you all to read the proposal and ask you as a body and individually to please write to council and ask them to reject this disastrous
plan. Thank you. Thank you. One minute. Uh, that's okay. Um, do you have time today to uh remain here? Um, how much longer is how do you have an estimate of how long? About an hour.
An hour. I actually have to run. I'm I have something that I need to do, but um I can I could leave my email if you need to or phone number if you Yeah, if you could do that. Sure, that'd be great. All right. Thank you. Plus, do you have questions?
But you do. Not not right now. I can No. Well, the only reason is because we motion to have this uh discussion at the end of the agenda. Yeah. Um, but if we have questions and we have an expert here, we can take
those questions now while we I don't want to take Do you guys all have questions too? I mean, other Marissa is it? Thank you. I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry.
Okay. In the interest of time, Matt. Uh the committee does have uh some questions for you. Uh so this would probably be a a good opportunity. Okay. I just um agree with you. I just wanted to say that to you. Um my background is landscape.
So, uh school and I agree that it just shouldn't be all sad. So, I will definitely be uh thinking more thoroughly on this, getting in touch and Okay, great. and voicing my opinion on it.
Thank you. Go ahead. I don't have any real questions except to express some concerns when we get to the item on approval of agenda. Okay. Okay. Similar to what some of what Marie has said. Yeah. Okay. Michelle,
same as said. Good. Um, can you briefly summarize why this proposal came up? Um, so my understanding the way it was presented at the meeting was as a unification of the code um that
currently exists and I there is currently code um on the right or the swailes in particular. There's a swale policy that was passed in 2019 um that I just learned about this last week. Um but it it is actually a little bit
tricky to find. Um I we my my husband and I found it and put it on our website which is to questionnotes.org. Um but you have to go search the archives is online because it's not actually in ordinance text. Um, so I guess to answer
your question a little bit more, the um I do think it would be a good idea to codify that the swale policy and there was a driveway policy, a swale policy and a permitting process and to make that more widely known. Um, because I think that would address if that was in
the code and easier to find and residents knew about it. I think that would address a lot of the problems that well the a lot of the potential problems for for the utilities and storm and public works directors. This sounds like we have a pretty good
idea of the disadvantages of this proposal. I'm just curious what the benefits are. Um I I like I think part of it is that there there was a desire to have greater access to the underground pipes. um as I understand the rules right now that the
um public works can access those pipes and if you have things you have plants in the right way they can they have to go and if there's an emergency or it needs replacement which is a totally reasonable rule um and that's okay but um this proposal would preclude that and
by it by its strict terms um and I don't think that's necessary which is why I would like to see us go back to what we had or to to leave what we have to allow landscaping in the right of ways and swailes especially bioail biosail
principles to be implemented um because I think that can really help with the both aesthetically and in terms of filtering the water before it gets to the storm drains system. Got thank you very much. Uh that was actually I was just looking
up the code um as it was written but I don't have any additional questions right now. Okay. I appreciate your time and um do uh leave your information. Thank you. Oh, I was just going to ask for her information. Great. Thanks,
Email. I I believe I have it, but um if not, Marie, can you just email it to me and I'll send it forward? I will. Yeah. Great to talk to you. Any other citizens that would like to speak? Okay. Uh so we'll start with our first presentation
um from SWA uh Katie Sprock. I think I spray. Sorry. No problem. And Andre, I didn't get your last name. Cardona. Cardona. Uh and they're going to uh speak to us about education uh or uh speak to us
about the integrated solid waste management system at SWA. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thanks for having us here today. Uh, my name is Katie Sprig and I'm the education and outreach supervisor at the Solid Waste Authority. Has anybody visited us for a tour
before? No. No. Okay. Well, I would like to invite you to come visit us at some point. If nothing else, we have an open house event on November 2nd. You can come see the facilities, but we to start things off, we have the cleanest and greenest
renewable energy facility in North America. And Palm Beach County has been number one in the state of Florida for recycling for the last three years. So, thank you all for your efforts for that. And I'm just going to talk a little bit about what we do and what you would see if you come visit us. We like to say
welcome to Away when you come see us because whether you throw it, recycle it, or even flush it away, we put your waste to work. The solid waste authority was established in 1975 by a special act of the Florida state legislature and we are
a dependent special district of the county. We are a government agency responsible for the countywide disposal as well as collection in unincorporated Palm Beach County. We manage an integrated system of solid waste management including two renewable
energy facilities, a recovered materials processing facility, the recycling, one bioolids processing facility, a landfill, six transfer stations, and seven home chemical and recycling centers. We're all familiar with Palm Beach
County. We are one of the largest counties in the state of Florida in terms of land area and fourth largest in terms of population. about 1.5 million people throughout the county. And the way we more efficiently manage our waste is through a system of six
transfer stations. Have you visited your local transfer station? Yeah. Off of um Military and Donald Ross. So those trucks that come around to pick up at your curb stop there and then we fill up our S SWA tractor trailers from there because they can hold about seven times
as much as your local garbage truck. That way we're reducing the number of trucks on the road, reducing pollution, time, drivers, all of that. This is our main campus off of North Jaw Road. We are located between 45th Street
and Beine and have about 1300 acres there. I know the text is a little small to see here, but on this site are most of what I mentioned besides those six transfer stations. These are all of the ways that we manage the solid waste. Starting with our
recovered materials processing facility at the top. We have a dual stream recycling system here in Palm Beach County. Meaning we have things that go in the blue bin and the yellow bin and we keep those items separate. Many places, especially in the US, have a single stream system where everything is
put together. Having two bins to separate at home reduces the contamination overall. So that has helped us get to the highest rate in the state for the three years in a row. Of course, this is one of our most important things that we are doing to
pull out the material before it gets into our mainstream. So we ask residents to do it at home. The home chemical and recycling center drop off service where Palm Beach County residents can drop off home hazardous waste for free and that is at each of
the six transfer stations. We also have a main location off of North Job Road. Can I ask a question? Where is the closest station to here? Uh, it's Donald Ross and Military. It's off of S SWA Road. Awesome. Yeah.
I've heard that the Jupiter Transfer Station is our busiest one, too. Lots of people dropping off um Home Hazardous Waste. Okay. It's actually just for myself. But I do have brochures for you, too, that shows you the map and what all can be
dropped off there. But everything from cooking oil to lithium batteries to uh old American flags. We even at those facilities, not that it's a hazardous waste, but we do give them a proper disposal.
Renewable energy facilities one and two are where we burn the garbage to make electricity. We've been doing that here in Palm Beach County since 1989. And our newest facility was built in 2015. That is what I refer to as the cleanest and greenest renewable energy facility in
North America. We're also the most recent one built in about the last 25 years. We make enough electricity to power all of our facilities off of North Jo and we sell the extra to Florida Power and Light and can power around 90,000 homes
each year. The bioolids pelletizer is where we take that flush and turn it into fertilizer. So when you flush the toilet, it goes down the drain to a wastewater treatment facility. They take the liquids and send us the solids. We heat that up using
methane from the landfill to dry it out to kill off any pathogens and then pelletize it and it's turned into an eco-friendly fertilizer amendment. The landfill is our last resort for waste. So, by default in Palm Beach
County, anything you throw in the garbage goes to one of our renewable energy facilities. It is not directly landfilled. We are trying to maximize the time that we have with this landfill because there's really no ideal spot in Palm
Beach County to build a new one. Right now, we are looking at 207 for a closure date. that changes with population, with possible hurricanes. Uh we are also investigating ways to additionally
maximize that time. Once the landfill is full, it will be turned into something for public use. If you've ever visited Dyer Park or Parkridge Golf Course in Lantana, both of those are old landfills. I did talk a little bit about our
recycling program already, but we started recycling in Palm Beach County in 1987 and have a have had a continuous recycling program since then. All 39 county municipalities do participate.
As you can see, in 2022, we had an 80% recycling rate, 84% in 2023, and 90% in 2024. As with most of our facilities, the recovered materials processing facility
is owned by the solid waste authority but operated under contract by circular services. So they are the ones who have the employees actually working on the floor. The recovered materials are then marketed by the SWA. We get better
quality and better value for the commodities. And we have long-term sales contracts for mixed paper and old car corrugated containers. Monthly bids for aluminum and plastics. I have this information on a magnet up
here if you'd like to take one home. It settles a lot of arguments in the household. You probably are familiar with the bins up here, but the blue bin gets plastic bottles and containers. We keep those lids on. Food and beverage cans made of
aluminum and steel, glass bottles and jars with the lids removed, milk and juice cartons, drink boxes, and no pouches, no straws, anything like that. The yellow bin gets paper and cardboard,
newspaper, dry food boxes. Pizza boxes are a major question. If the top is clean, you can rip that top off and put it into your yellow bin and then throw the bottom in the garbage. In the middle is probably the most important part, the please do nots,
including plastic bags. Those are a major problem for us as they get tangled in our machinery. We also do not take styrofoam, aluminum foil or pans, shredded paper, plastic utensils or straws. No paper plates, paper towels, napkins, tissues, anything
like that. No coat hangers, whether they're made of metal or plastic, and no light bulbs. Of course, we don't take needles or lithium batteries in the recycling bin either. Did you say milk cartons go in the blue? Yes, that is a common question as well.
Yes. So, a lot of people think, "Oh, it's cardboard. It goes in the yellow bin." It actually is a wax plastic material with a lining of foil and it has had that food or beverage inside of it. So, we put that in our blue bin to keep it separate from our paper.
Well, then I'm sorry. That's okay. That's why we do this, right? There we go. Okay. So, this is curbside collection. We do see that the trucks have a split body. You're probably well familiar with that. Um the local trucks in West Palm come directly to our
facility. Otherwise, we have our tractor trailers that come into either the yellow bin side or the blue bin side from our transfer stations and unload on the tipping floor and then we're going to start the separation process. So, we are not
actually making new products here. We are instead further separating what our residents give us and selling that material to be turned into new products. So over here the first thing that will happen is there's a contamination sort. We there are workers who pull out big
items that should not have gone into the bins. This is all done by hand at this point. And then there's a star screen that separates cardboard which stays on top while the paper falls down below. And you can see that plastic bag getting tangled there. That does happen
frequently. The machinery has to be shut down and cut out by hand. More contamination separation here. And then the truml spins out broken glass, dirt, sand before the paper goes onto a conveyor belt and is eventually
loaded into our bailing machine. The paper stays inside so the duds doesn't get wet and then the companies come pick it up to be turned into new paper products. Can I ask you a question? Yes. That do those machines have the ability
of not only just separating what you just showed us there but also glass, metal, plastics? That's the other side which is right now. Um, so yes, we do have separation on the blue bin side as well. You'll see the tipping floor, completely separate sides of the
building. From the time you put it out, it's separated. You can see our S SWA tractor trailers have a walking floor to unload here. And then we're going to use some high-tech materials and some low tech uh machines to separate. The first thing that happens here is
that conveyor belt gets loaded again and it's going to pass under a magnet. The magnets pulling out the steel cans for separation. That's the belt magnet there. And then those get dropped into a
separate bunker outside. The trucks are loaded up from there and then contamination sort on this side before a glass breaker. So everything bounces on top of there except the glass which shatters falls down below. Then we have aluminum cans to separate.
We use an eddiurren system to repel the aluminum cans just a little bit further off the line. The plastics drop straight down and then the plastic has to be separated based on density. So if you think about your water bottle is different than your laundry detergent bottle. So, we use
optical sorters to separate with puffs of air based on the density and they'll go onto four different conveyor belt lines and the computers are reading that. So, you see laundry detergent bottles, milk jugs, soda and water bottles, and
then there's a line for everything else. They're stored in a bunker until there's enough. And our newest addition is our AI robot arm we've nicknamed Roxy. So there is AI that reads what's on the belt and it is pulling out number five
plastics as well as cartons. There's a market if we can separate those from everything else. So they go into the bor get wrapped up with that ste steel twine and then we can leave the plastics outside until they're picked up. Aluminum stays
inside. Is this is it is this sold to private companies domestically, internationally? Um, we work with a lot of brokers who purchase it and then sell it to additional clients. Um, it just depends. We do get requests from all over the
world for specifically Palm Beach County materials because they are known for being clean. I know. Isn't that wild? Um, a normal single stream system has anywhere from 30 to 40% contamination and our dual
stream system is around 10 to 12%. So if a recycler purchases for us that from us, they are more likely to be getting the material they purchased and so they're going to come back and buy again. Is 100% of that get sold to brokers or
is a certain percent? No. Um, I I can't say specifically what percent. And the plastics and aluminums are are a monthly bid process. So that might change within the month who it gets sold to. A lot of our paper goes to North Florida and South Georgia to the
paper mills. Our glass goes to a company on the west coast of Florida that um turns it into recycled glass products. And so if it doesn't get sold, then it goes to the landfill. No. No. We sell all the recycling that is correct that comes to us. Yes. None of
it's landfilled unless it's not what we ask for. You know, if you're putting plastic bags in your bins, that's going to go to the renewable energy facilities. Question. Yeah. Uh Katie, you mentioned one of the advantages of having dual stream, less contamination.
Uh what are what are the advantages of having single stream? Do we benchmark ourselves against it's easier for the residents to throw everything into one bin? um participation rates go up typically.
I think it's hard to judge participation rates versus uh what's actually good because I know a lot of single stream places the bin is exactly the same size as the garbage can and has a lid on it and everything and that tends to be a second
garbage can that haulers don't realize. They've dumped it in with clean recycling possibly and now it's contaminated with more garbage. So they might participate, but that's not to say they put the correct things in that single stream bin. Is there is there any measurement in
your industry about um net collection per household available in a single stream versus a dual stream? I'm sure there is. I don't have that off the top of my head, but I I'm sure they can compare based on populations and all
of that, but um all the other counties around us have single stream. And I think there's maybe one other county in Florida that is dual stream and it's a much smaller county. So you would say we're in the minority of the counties. Yes. In the state of Florida. But if you
think about places outside of the US, uh Europe, uh a lot of places make you recycle into more than two bins, you know, and you get charged for how much garbage you throw away versus recycling being free or included in services. No.
Okay. Just a quick question. Um, I was told by a public's employee that they now take all their bags back and other bags. They accept all that blue stuff that you don't want and they have their own manufacturing place. Have you heard anything about this? Yes.
Is that true or is that a lie? I can't speak to what Publix actually does with them, but I have the same information that they collect those bags and the styrofoam outside of the stores as well as places like Target, Kohl's, that sort of thing, and then they take care of it on their own. They don't come to us
with that. Um, two questions. One, do you also sell the fertilizer that you create? And then the other was was um do you do any compost? So I have a slide about composting at
the end but um the company that contract operates the bioolids facility is called Synagrow and they are responsible for marketing and the selling of that product. So it's part of the contract that they take care of that. So it's it goes goes to private
effectively. Yeah. Yeah. So yeah it's within the contract and I'm not familiar with all the details of their contract but yes they market it and sell it. Okay. Why don't we let her finish her presentation? I mean, I Yeah, I'll talk about everything and then if you want to ask
specific questions later. I know this was a major thing, so I want to make sure we talk about the home chemical and recycling centers. We do have those drop offs at each of the transfer stations and the bins are very clearly labeled with what should go in each. Uh used oil
is a big thing that uh especially at the unmanned transfer stations. So, if you're bringing oil or gasoline in, you're going to have to leave your container behind. If you come to one of the stations where there is staff during staffed hours, our main
facility off of North Jo, and then the one in West Delray, there are large containers where you can pour it out and take your container back. So we do take old paint, propane tanks, fluorescent tube light bulbs, CFLs, old electronics, pesticides,
cleaners, uh all sorts of chemicals like that. We do not take anything radioactive at these facilities. Um once they are dropped off, we pick them up, process them in terms of sorting and separation.
Some of it gets sent out to be disposed of responsibly. Some of it gets sent out to be recycled as it can. So the electronics, they can pull out the metals and recycle those bits and pieces. It just depends what it is.
But that is a service that's provided to Palm Beach County residents for free. You can drop off during the specific hours at the transfer stations. Super easy. One of our main focuses with that has been lithium batteries,
rechargeable batteries. A lot of people don't realize that many everyday objects contain a rechargeable battery and those can cause fires that are very difficult to put out. If it's damaged and water gets introduced, it can cause a thermal
runaway that you have to dump many gallons of water on to put out. And we don't want that happening in the back of a garbage truck. We don't want it happening at our recycling facility. We don't want it happening at our renewable energy facilities. So, we're asking residents to bring those to us so we can
dispose of them. One of the biggest things I think that I've learned is the greeting cards that sing have lithium batteries in them. So, somebody might think they could recycle that and then we Yeah. could be in
trouble with it. I didn't know that. Renewable energy facility 2 burns postrecycled solid waste to create energy. This is aerial shot of it. Our tractor trailers again come in from the transfer stations and drop off directly
into the pit. This is if you've seen Toy Story 3, very similar. and they unload directly into the pit to start the process of drying out the garbage and mixing it up. This is a mass burn facility, so
everything goes into the fire hole. There's no recycling that's done on the front end. We only pull out metals on the back end. There are claws that mix up that garbage, let it dry out for a little while, and then eventually drop it into one of
three combustion chambers. This facility can process 3,000 tons of garbage a day and it is 24/7 365. There's always somebody there burning garbage. See the claws here. And this facility is
managed by a company called Reworld. And here that fire is burning over 2,000° F. hopefully completely combusting that garbage. Around the combustion chambers, our tubes filled with water. The water boils and turns into steam. We then
superheat the steam to dry it out before sending it to a turbine and generator to make electricity. We also collect the rain water from the roofs of these buildings to be used in the process. That's often one of the negatives of wasted energy is how water intensive it is. But with that process,
collecting the rain as well as we recycle the steam, we cover and condense it. We did not have to increase the groundwater permit that was already in place when we built this facility. So that's the electricity uh switchyard
where it's sent out. And that's our air cooled condenser where we cool the steam back down using 15 fans and then reuse it in the process. Once we have burned that garbage, there is uh gases that we need to clean. So,
we have over half of the building dedicated to air pollution control systems, including activated carbon to adhere to mercury. We have spray dryer absorbers to neutralize acid gases with a lime slurry.
We have bag houses that collect the fly ash so that doesn't get out into the environment. And we also have what is the state-of-the-art technology, the selected catalytic reduction system that neutralizes the nitrous oxides.
So we are set specific permit levels by the EPA and the DP and we regularly go below those limits. Those permits are already on par with a natural gas facility and we go below those quite often. So, what's left over, you can see on the
screen there, is the ash and the melted metals. We pull out those metals for recycling before we load the ash into trucks and take it across the street to a landfill. The whole reason we have these facilities is volume reduction. For
every 10 trucks that come in carrying garbage, one truck leaves with ash. The bioolids processing facility is in partnership with six local wastewater utilities and we take about 95% of the county's wastewater solids.
Like I said, that landfill gas is used as an energy source to process the bioolids and it's sold to fertilizer blenders and distributed nationally. So that picture you see up there is the final poo product and that is the pellet. If you're familiar with morganite, it's a
similar type of product. Composting. We do not have commercial composting um at our facilities. We also while we encourage backyard composting currently there is no permitting for composting commercially in Palm Beach
County. Right now we use that material. We have capacity for that in our renewable energy facilities and that is why we used to do composting but at the time it was not financially feasible to continue it and we couldn't
get anybody to take it. So we don't do the composting, we do the bioolids instead. And like I said with the renewable energy facilities were able to process that through there. Now, if you have a school, a golf course community that can compost on site, use it on
site, that's perfectly fine. You just can't leave the property within Palm Beach County. Like I said, the landfill is the last resort for solid waste. You've probably seen it a million times driving up and down the turnpike. We do have two what
looks like two hills. They are being built in towards each other and eventually hopefully 207 or later it will be one big hill. It is not a dump. We uh double line our
cells before anything is put in to make sure nothing's getting out into the groundwater into the soil. We collect the leeate or garbage juice to pull that out of the cells as well. And once a cell is full, once it's filled with the
ash, we'll seal it up with another liner as you see on the left hand side, put soil on top of it, plant grass, move on to the next cell. And we have cells built waiting for us to need, you know, in the future so we're not having to wait for that.
Here's a diagram of what a landfill cell looks like. You can see there's a primary and secondary liner. the leech collection system. If we were putting garbage in, we would alternate protective soil with those garbage layers. We also pull out that methane so
it doesn't build up in the cell. As I said, Dyer Park and Parkidge Golf Course are both old landfills that have been converted into county park areas. Gives us an opportunity in South Florida to play on a hill, which doesn't happen very frequently.
And we're big on industry and nature coexisting. We have about 300 acres of protected wildlife area with trails that are open to the public. They also connect to the Grassy Waters trail system. That is where the city of West Palm Beach gets part of its drinking
water and just next door we have facilities that are burning garbage. We have an entire environmental department that is responsible for making sure we are not polluting. We have two people on staff whose sole job it is to test water quality. It's all they do at our
different sites. So, we have this area because when they were originally sighting the landfill, they found the endangered Everglades snail kite roosting in the area. So, we moved the landfill to its current location and now we have this protected wildlife area. We
have so many Florida animals out there. I've seen otter. I've seen deer. Uh alligators. Lots of birds. Woodstos like to hang out. Rosette spoon bills. And we'd have the environmental team doing bird counts. It's actually
one of the most productive rrookeries in the county. So the birds are in quite high population in that area. So, a lot of big things, a lot of big numbers here, but we like to emphasize that we can all reduce, reuse, recycle, and rethink our waste and do our parts
to recycle right every day. So, it's not just about recycling. It's about recycling the right things for us. And waste management, recycling is all very local. So what happens here in Palm Beach County is not necessarily what's going to happen in Martin County or
Broward County or anywhere outside of Florida. So our waste is managed right here in Palm Beach County. Questions? Um well the first question I had was about mercury and you said you've got like carbon filtration that that
captures it. I suppose is uh is that a recently a newly introduced uh uh filtration option? No. Um as far as I'm aware, it's a pretty common filtration option and
we've actually had less mercury in the waist stream than we used to because manufacturers aren't putting it in things like they used to, but it's still incorporated to account for what is there. I was glad to hear that. Um, in regard to the blue bins, the uh
the photo that you showed, you know, they showed the yellow bin, the standard blue bin, and then a taller blue bin. Um, how do you get one of those taller blue? Is it have is there a requirement that you have to meet in order to get that? No. No. All you have to do is either
track us down on an event or give us a call or uh go online and it'll be dropped off. Oh, okay. Yeah. Um, two other questions. One, um, you know, you mentioned some of the
things that you don't accept in in the waist stream. And then the you said that robotic eye thing could spot some plastics that you don't use or others. It's removed from the stream and used in a different
pro way. Um but what what do you do with the things that are that come to you in the waist stream but are not things that you can either give to others, sell to others or do something with. What do you
do with that? So the only separation happens at the recycling facility. So that's only going to come to us through the yellow bin or the blue bin. Anything that you throw away is going to go to one of the renewable energy facilities where it's burned. So there's really no separation
that happens there in terms of we're not pulling out plastic bottles or cardboard boxes from that material. So if you throw it away, it's going to be burned. And then lastly, you know, recently here in Tquesta, we for the first time have
the automated collection of the garbage, the arm and this Jake thing. Is there can you see that coming down the pike for at least one of the two streams? I don't know. I haven't heard anything
about that because we're automated for garbage in unincorporated Palm Beach County as well. Um, but I don't know about the recycling because of the way the trucks are set up if that's possible or if they would even do that because of
the possibility of contamination. So the haulers, you know, if they see a bin that's full of garbage, they're not going to pick it up or they shouldn't be picking it up um because they can be fined for it on the other end if they're bringing us contaminated loads. So
there's that human element that might be missing if we do the automated, but I haven't heard anything about that yet. One of the big concerns from waste management was that uh workers compensation uh costs were skyrocketing because workers
were being worn out picking up you know heavy garbage cans and things like that. Yeah. So that is one of the things that we hear in the recycling in terms of wanting a larger yellow bin because people make a lot of cardboard. But if you notice when you fill your yellow bin it's heavier than when you fill your
blue bin. And so that's one of the reasons that we haven't gone to a larger yellow bin as an option for the pickup. Now multifamily communities, that's a different story. They get the the bigger containers and those are autoloaded, I
believe. So um but the average consumer resident isn't making that much. So they they want it for convenience, you know, and all that, but that's for the guys lifting. Okay, that was my questions. Thank you. You're welcome. Sure.
I just wanted to say this was a great presentation. I learned a lot. Go ahead. I'm glad you're here. Thank you. No problem. Michelle, um, when you talked about the mercury, so when it's extracted and any other toxic or heavy metals that get extracted, how do they get
processed? Where do they uh, so that in particular, I think is ends up being mixed in. I I'm going to have to research that first. ask some questions specifically, but my guess is that it is mixed in with
the bottom ash and the landfill, but okay, I will find out for you for sure. Yeah, interesting. Sure. I've got a couple. First of all, impressive. I impressed and surprised by how much
technology is throughout this entire process. So, thank you for going through all that. Yeah. And enduring our questions alone. No problem. I do have a few more though followed. Um the separation has anyone uh any estimates of perhaps how much garbage
the percent of garbage uh that is put in normal garbage bins contain recyclables? I don't know if that's something we can estimate because of the amount that we get. It's about 1.8 million tons a year.
So I don't know if there's ever been any studies like hey here here comes a truck let's just I know it would take a long long time right to do this but I would the reason I'm asking the question is there's been a lot of discussion on this committee about how
could we get to a a single stream for our community and the reason why it's just simple right simple for consumers they don't have to understand all the do nots all the dos the separate you can include milk cartons over here but out over there. So there's I understand the
rules, but I'm just trying to think from a consumer standpoint. Recycle everything, send it off, and then it'd be separated. So that that would be that would be one of the I I wouldn't say goal necessarily, but it's been a discussion point for us. And after
seeing everything that you covered here, I'm not sure it's going to be that easy. Right. I I know that this is the way we do it in Palm Beach County. Other counties do it differently. There's probably, you know, pros and cons against each approach. Um, but I was
just curious if there if you ever see that occurring. You can see a path to that. No, we will never go single stream. Um, I will give you an example. Uh, Lakeworth Beach for about 10 years was
not part of the system. They had a contract with Waste Management to take their single stream recyclables out of county. And at that time throughout the contract, I believe Waste Management was paying them about 10 bucks a ton for their materials. When that contract was
up, they came back and said to the city, "That's no longer feasible for us. We will be charging you, I think it was $90 a ton to process their recyclables." So, City of Lakeworth Beach said, "No, thank you. We will come back to the county system." And that's why we've got all 39
municipalities participating now. Okay. So that has been fairly recently. I want to say 2018 or so is when they came back to the system. Okay. The uh and just one last point on
the the reason for the interest in seeing how many recyclables perhaps end up in garbage. is to try to determine maybe those are folks who either accidentally did that or just refused to recycle because of the complexity of the
system that they through their eyes right. Um and so I was just curious if the net result of a single stream versus a dual stream net are we getting more of everything all the outcomes that we really want. Um, and I didn't know if you you're obviously very very close to
this and probably just mark the Palm Beach operation off of other counties throughout the country. Uh, but I was just curious how we end up ranking in that regard. Yeah, so you can go online. Uh, the D publishes reports every year of all the counties and the waste they bring in.
The 90% that we have, it does incorporate credits for waste energy as well as construction and demolition debris recycling. But our traditional rate, I think I'm going to say we're either fourth or fifth in the state in terms of traditional and all of the
counties above us have well below a million people in terms of population. Thank you very much. Yeah, you're welcome. That's all the question. I got it all done during the presentation. Um, thank you very much. I appreciate it. Uh, have you ever partnered with a
municipality to um have what I don't know it's called different things an amnesty day for hazardous household hazardous waste? We were just talking about uh before um not as far as I'm aware. What we do have you might have seen on the um flyer over
here is we have host two shred days and collect lithium batteries and other hazardous waste during that time. The main way we handle it is through the transfer station drop offs. So that's open at any time that the residents want to bring materials there.
Okay. And within hours obviously. Would you be willing to try a I can't commit to anything like that. I can give you the contact information for the people that you can reach out to though. Okay. Um because this is another point
that we've discussed u you know to some extent um and I'm not saying like all household hazardous waste necessarily probably it would be best served to have maybe the top three uh that are produced
the most by the households in inquesta um to be able to make it easy for them to drop off locally versus driving down to uh Donald Ross. Uh the problem with that is that then the
materials still have to be transported to wherever and so it's you know coordinating that effort. So are are your uh trucks certified to we do pick up between the transfer
stations? Yes. But I don't know where the um where the line is basically. you know, if we do it for village of Tquesta, do we have to do it for Bokeh? And then, you know, like that sort of thing. I I don't know. So, I can give you the cont. It would be um Bob Madden,
who I think you already reached out to. Okay. I know I I used to be the village manager here, and I know we had a hazardous materials pickup day in conjunction with waste management in
the late 80s or the early 90s. I just don't remember exactly but it kind of went the reason I bring it up is what you said about you know the uh the hauling of what's collected at that that was done by waste management.
Yeah. That that was that was their end of the bargain was that they would take it to you guys. Yeah. So that would be something for them to figure out on their side. We already have our answer. Julie has a question.
Yes, go ahead. Um, the transfer station is really fabulous and maybe that's a really neat idea that you all have having a day here for those people who don't want to just go to military trail, but maybe we could
do that ourselves within toqua and just take it down to the transfer station. Depends on the as the environmental board and maybe get containers. That's what we're going to be driving from solid waste. Use your car. Have somebody use I was going to say so one of the
concerns that um you know people drop off things that are not labeled and or things that you don't know what they are. And so I would hesitate to put that into a personal vehicle, not you know next to something that it could possibly interact with. So
and if I can jump in for a second. So Chief McGlaughlin, our fire chief is here to answer this from the vill's perspective to the best of my ability. Chief. Okay. Well, thank you all for having us today, too.
Um, so the single stream and dual stream. So you're um sorting facility. Mhm. Not set up for single stream. Correct. Does S SWA have facilities anywhere else that that are set up for single stream? No, we're solely Palm Beach County. So,
you're solely Palm Beach County. Okay. Um, yeah, the county commissioners are actually our board as well. So, we're solely within responsible for the county's waste. So, completely different companies operate every different county or
it depends. Uh, in Broward right now, most of the cities are on their own. They are working on forming an authority, but they manage it individually. So, Fort Lauderdale is separate from Diorfield. Got it. Okay. Uh,
do you take smoke detectors at the home chemical and recycling centers? Yes. Okay. Um, any kind? As far as I'm aware, yes, because there are smoke detectors that do have radioactive material in them.
That I'm not sure about. You could always give them a call and check. Yeah. Um, well, we do have radiation detectors at all the sites to make sure that, you know, it might be minor enough or I don't know how they handle that. Yeah, they're they're safe as long as
the smoke detector isn't tampered or or destroyed in some way. Uh, real quick. Okay, super. Thank you so much for your time. I appreciate it. No problem. And if anybody has any additional questions, please just let me know and I can pass them along.
Okay. Are you leaving these uh things for us? Yes, I'll leave the materials. I believe we already took some, too. So, whatever you'd like. Yes. Okay. You're welcome. Thank you. Okay. Uh next, uh discussion presentation.
You're next. Uh fire chief John Mclofflin. That's correct. I'm John McLolin. I've been the fire chief here in Toquest. I'm also the emergency manager. Um Jay approached me a couple of weeks ago. Um, apparently you've all had discussions about um a one-day home hazardous waste
type of a collection point. So, I'm going to give you a little background about what we do first and then uh who we coordinate with for our emergency response for hazardous materials and then what we do for non-emergency between us and the police department and then kind of some uh I'm not going to go
either way on what you all want to go forward with with that one day type of thing, but my colleague hit on most of the stuff that I was going to speak about. So, um first off, we don't have a hazmat team here. We do fire and EMS and water rescue, but we are support unit
for Palm Beach County's hazardous materials response team. A matter of fact, we had a call on Point Drive the other day and we responded with them for a gas leak for a 500gallon tank that nobody even knew was in the ground. So, um, they did a great job and we have a great relationship with them when it
comes to emergency response for hazardous materials, but we leave it to them because they're all technicians and they're they're pros. Um, not emergency wise, we will take uh sharps within a sharps container like needles for people that are diabetics and things of that nature. We do have a drop off point for
that within the fire department and then that just goes with our needle containers that get picked up by a private subcontracted company that comes for biohazards waste from the fire rescue department. PD has a pill collection container. So, they will take
discarded meds that people find and they don't know what they are. They're old in their cabinet. they will take those. Um, so that's kind of what we do emergency non-emergency wise on the one day collection stuff as as she said. Um, I'm not against or for. There's some and I
have it I have a few things written down. I apologize and I'm not feeling well. So if I have to cough, I'm going to apologize in advance. Um, so there are a few things. There are some liabilities with it. Uh, one of them is regulatory stuff because there is a potential for a spill or a leak or
something. As she said, there is an an issue with unmarked containers. So, this is basically done by a private company a toz. They would come here like a waste management or an SWS or is Cliff Berry still in business? Yeah. So, they're probably Broward. I'm
from Broward the bulk of my career and they're a huge waste disposal company down there and I remember them doing that stuff for um Single Point Municipalities. So, we would have to hire them. We would have to go outside. It's all subcontracted. They would have to bring in their waste removal and
transport people. Um getting into the business of transporting hazardous materials, once again I agree, not in our best interest to do anything like that. We cannot transport hazardous materials other than biohazardous waste we use on an EMS run. That's it. Um there is an
OSHA worker health and safety liability concern as well. Those people bring that with them. They'll have those contracts in place. They'll staff it with their own folks and we wouldn't have to worry about any of our employees being involved with it whatsoever. Um the transport and disposal chain of custody issue is also a concern, but once again
the private company handles that. they would handle all the legalities when it came to that that type of stuff. The bigger concern for me is in your guys' wheelhouse is the site environmental liability because I don't know where we'd want to do this at. Um I don't imagine we'd want to do it out here in
front of the hall, maybe at one of the parking lots of the parks, but it causes it causes some headaches. I I've seen it done in Fort Lauderdale. It's where I worked for the bulk of my career and and it's it's not undoable. I would never say it's not. We can get it done, but it it just comes with some there's some
hoops to jump through is is what I'm getting at. Um and then obviously the contractual and third party stuff uh insurance wise that would have to all be handled uh between the contract that we drop with whoever we decide to hire. Um so to get it done, um that's all the bad
stuff. So getting it done, obviously we'd have to confirm and make it very very clear what we're going to take and not take cuz that's just going to slow down the collection point. Um going to Jupiter to where they have their HHW there. They take just about everything
with the exception of the the larger nuclear stuff and uh I hopefully no one in the village has anything that large of nuclear waste to take down there. um medical things of that nature they can't take, but they I've gotten lots of calls on marine waste being flares and marine
batteries and fuel and things like that. So, um I lean them all to Jupiter and I've had everybody's been fairly successful getting their stuff taken there. I haven't had any concerns. Um experienced licensed contractor and somebody that can transport this. Obviously, the insurance issues, a sight
specific safety plan. I'm a Florida state safety officer, so I could obviously deal with that and and save us some issues there. Um, once again, we would have to set what materials, how much they could bring. We can't have somebody rolling in here with a, you know, 500gallon gas tank, which if you
don't set that, they will. Um, especially if you limit it outside of the village and people that are residents of the villages, the villages, the village of the Questa, pardon me. Um, traffic control and public safety, PD would probably have to be involved in this in some way. uh obviously the
documentation of it all if you can possibly catalog what you're doing and what you're taking um and then we would have to be coordinating with Palm Beach County and maybe the Martin County for their hazardous materials team in case we did have some type of a release or something we weren't able to um diagnose
or figure out what it was cuz not everything is going to come with a label. You got to have a lot of unmarked stuff. People move into houses, they leave the garages full of house I bought had a garage full of stuff that I had to take to Martin Countyy's facility. And then obviously our village attorney would have to look at any contract and
make sure that it's all above board and that it's the the the risk is worth the or the reward is worth the risk. Um cuz there is some inherent risk there. Um I'm sorry I don't have a fantastic slideshow. It was awesome. I
learned so much. um more or less is my information to give you. And if you have any questions for me, I am a hazmat tech as well, but I'm I'm the only one in the department. So, it'd be hard for me to do this by myself. Um but if you want to move forward with this, I obviously can
help and give you some guidance however I can, as long as with my colleagues over there and whatever, you know, whoever we go out to bid with. But I I don't think it's a a bad idea. I just don't know how feasible it is if you want my honest opinion on You just don't think it's a good idea.
I just I think it's a great because I've seen it done and it's it's successful. Um people get rid of a lot of stuff. I had we had people that we had turned away. Um people were showing up with old ammunition and old World War II stuff and the cops were having to come over do
it. So like isn't this a like serious? Please go there far away. So um once again I I think it's a great idea. It's a great initiative, but Jupiter is very close. I know it's not around the corner, but it is close
enough to get rid of this stuff without us, you know, inheriting some of the liability and the cost that comes with this. Um, but that's really what I have. I'm trying not to lean you in either direction. I will assist in any way you need, but if you all have any questions for me, I'm glad to take them. I hope I
can answer. No, that was very informative. Thank you. You know, I I realize it's more in depth than we think just throwing an idea out. I'm glad she said all that, too. Because I was like, God, now I'm validated. I feel great. I feel much better about myself. You know, I'm really off the
cuff here a little bit. So, that was very helpful. No problem. Thank you. You had a very good outline in your presentation, steps that would be needed to make it successful. Yeah. And it may be more than it may be more than we can handle right now. And once again, I might be able to
streamline some of this stuff. Um, but it it once again I would have to dig a lot deeper. get with public works, do with Jay and and see what we can come up with to you know the other thing I wanted to say though I mentioned to everybody that back in the late 80s early 90s we did that here
but I'm pretty sure that they had not opened the Donald Ross drop off spot possibly not time it was not there but I can tell you I can tell you is you know in my case like say let's say every 10 years I I clear out the garage all
this I don't feel very comfortable driving down the highway with that stuff in my car. I agree 100%. I agree. Um and and the thing with the late ' 80s, early 90s, I got into the business in the early 90s and the we used to transport our hazmat teams would transport the hazardous
materials. Now we don't touch any of it. It's all done by third party private contractors and they have to contract with whoever the business is that had the release or the homeowner. Um we can't even guide them on the internet. we just have to tell them, call somebody to come get this this tank out of here
or whatever you have. Um, and they have to do it because we don't we can't lead them in a certain way. But the EPA regulations and OSHA regulations and hazer stuff and there's been so much um so many bills and so many acts that have come since then with environmental
protection related items. It's very difficult. Now hazmat is its own animal. It's it's a lot. Uh even the education has probably tripled since the early 90s to become a tech. Yeah. Yeah. Anything else, Michelle? Um not directly referred to, but to
still talk about this topic. Yeah. Yeah. Wait, thank you. I just want to say thank you. You covered a lot of practical things that need to be considered that we haven't really discussed in depth. So, thank you for that. Of course it, you know, this whole discussion between both of you just reminds me or made me,
it finally a light bulb for me went off is there are some materials out there that aren't acceptable by many people at all. And so what practically happens with those materials? Do consumers just, you know, our community, do they they just keep
them and contain them in their homes? Does that create a future fire hazard in their own home? Is there some other way? Do they just throw them away in garbage thinking, "Hey, I'll get away with it." The short answer to that is yes, that people just throw stuff away. And I'm sure you can absolutely relate. I I've
been in fires that have um ammunition has been going off in the house we're in, right? I mean, during a hurricane, actually. So, if you have everything happen all at once that happened to us. And I'm like, "What is that?" My buddy's a gun guy. And he goes, "Oh, those are rounds. He probably has a box of ammo near where the fire is." I went, "Are we all
right?" Like, he goes, "Yeah, they're just we're good." I didn't feel real comfortable. But once again, this happens all the time. Uh I'm sure people throw out the wrong stuff every day, all day long. And because they have that same concern you do, like, what do I do
with it? It was here when I bought the house or it's my granddad's old ammo or a World War II collection of hand grenades. What do I do with it? Oh, they're in. Well, I don't trust any of that either, especially driving down the road. So, I agree. So, yeah. I just so I just think think
about that practicality and then step back and go is would an idea like this even with all the impediments and things that need to be considered in its place. Would it still be worthwhile in the net, you know, of of what other alternatives are going to occur? We could say no,
we're not going to take it. We don't want to. It's a lot of work. But then the alternative could be worse. I'm just that's just wrapped in my mind right now. I'm not sure what the right answer is, but just I disagree. There's definitely fire hazards out there of things that people leave in their homes and they move into
they inherit a family member's home, whatever. Someone passes any of these things and they get in there and they just don't know what to do with it. You call the fire department, we don't do that. You call police department, we don't do that. You call solid waste. Well, they do most. They do almost
everything, but once again, radioactive stuff, you know, like what do you do? I I I totally agree. Um, but we would once again have to set some limitations on what we can take as well. Um, and and so there's there's obviously a few discussions to get this down the
road. Um, once again, I'm not I'm willing to try. I I will help you any problem challenge like do we insert ourselves into that problem, John? Maybe not, but I just that's a good discussion. Sure. Thank you, though. Not a problem. I will I will say the industry the solid based industry is
also pushing for producer responsibility and not putting things into the market until there's a disposal solution for those products like lithium batteries. Uh they were talking about there's a new vape pin that has a game on it that you get more points the deeper you inhale
the vape. So not only do you have the lithium battery and the chemicals in the vape pin, but you have electronics with it too. It's a whole mess. but not allowing these things out into the consumer market until there's a disposal for it. Thank you. One question.
Uh so in your experience working or maybe indirectly working with some of the private contractors that that you would contract with to uh collect as well as transport. Um what other So is it kind of like a they do
everything? It it all depends on a contract you you get with them. Like if you say, "Hey, we're going to provide you X, Y, and Z. You have to do they're going to ask you probably, what do you need? We need texts out here." Because they're going to be the ones transporting it. So they're not going to want to just drop off a container
and go when it's full call like that. They'll be much more engaged in managing the whole process. I would say in our best interest, I would have them run the whole show, honestly. And then we have a site safety team out there, which would be myself
and and people from my group. We would have PD out there for crowd and traffic control if anybody brought some type of a firearm to dispose of or anything like that cuz they do that over there. Um same thing with medical waste. We could be there to take sharp boxes that day once again. And um and then have maybe
Palm Beach County's hazmat team and we can make it more than just a drop off. We could and just thinking outside the box kind of like the coffee with a cop thing they do with the paper shredding day. maybe we could do a little more with it, you know, and uh have something, you know, for come see the truck or, you know, I'm just thinking
outside the box a little bit. Um, but once again, it's it's not it's not an unwinable project. It's just going to be one of those things where we'd have to find that third party um depending on the cost. I've seen some different numbers, but they're crazy. Like they're averaging $50 to $100 per
person, not knowing what the actual material is is what I've seen. But that's a pretty wide range um to pick up the bill when you don't know what it is cuz that's how they charge you. They can't go, "Hey, we're going to charge you 10,000, then you fill up four tractor trailers." And
that was a little more than Yeah. I don't know. That's the thing is I'd have to I've never really been on the admin side of this. I've been more on the hazardous material side of it as an operator and as a tech. Um just in case there was a spill, we were on a standby for it for something similar to this. Fire Chief mentioned Cliff Barry.
If they're still in business, that would be good place. They could contact us to talk. Yeah, you got waste management, you've got SWS, you've got CBI. I just don't know who's they all buy each other as they get bigger. And I don't even know who's runs those. I mean, I see Waste Management around here all the time, but
that's really it. Uh CBI is more of a commercial waste transport type of company. Same with SWS down south. Uh I don't even know if they operate in Palm Beach County to be honest with you. So, one of our thoughts might be starting
small, just do a specific item, paint and batteries and maybe one other thing. That could be something, you know. Sure. That kind, you know, start off. And certain paints can go actually in your regular waste. I just found that out today, which I didn't know. Correct. Water-based paints can go in your regular garbage. Dry.
Yeah. As long as it's dry. Once it's dry, you can put it in your regular. It's the oil based stuff and mineral spirits and all that has to go with hazardous materials or what they call HHW. Yeah. I I think one of our biggest problems is we probably have a huge
portion of the population that does not know that the trans person drop off on near Donald Ross Road exists. You could put it in your newsletter and it's no cost to the to the user. Um they've got great hours. I'm not trying
to sell but it is a great option, you know. Um yeah, that's good. Okay. Yeah. Any other questions for the chief? I appreciate it. You guys can reach out to me individually, personally, whatever you guys want. If you need any more information, if you want me to come back
to another workshop or meeting, I'm glad to. It will. If I can jump in, our deadline for smoke signals is next Monday. So, that's the the newsletter that goes out. So, we probably have some time to put something together. If you want to get something in the newsletter,
let me know. of our educational part of it can be starting off with information that was provided today. Um, and also little bits involved like the dried water-based paints that you can dispose of that in your regular trash.
Um, and then also letting them know where SWA is located for creating. It's free. It's free. Yeah, it is great. We'll we'll talk about that. Absolutely. Maybe we organize a day. Everybody drives their own stuff.
Maybe encourage. Yeah, just encourage to get an encouragement going. Um, give them all gift card. We can talk we can talk in a second here about this. We're going to charge ahead at the consent agenda. Um, the minutes from our
last meeting in September. U, any changes to them that need to be made? Okay, we'll make a motion. Uh, somebody want to make a motion? Well, I read them. I'll make a motion to approve the minutes of whatever the date is of the last meeting.
September 10th. I don't have in front of me. September 10th. September 10th, 2025. I second. All right. All those in favor? I motion carries. All right. New business in the regular agenda.
Um, so yeah, I gave uh a little dog and pony show to council. Um, when was that? Like maybe that same week. Yeah, it was it was the day after our last meeting.
Um, so I think it went well and I took your advice way because I thought that really kind of crystallized everything um, with regard to marrying up the strategic goals and initiatives of
Questa with ours gave it more weight. Um, uh, I I think I sent that to you. Yes, everyone. You did. Uh so the response from council I think was overall positive on all of our initiatives. Uh
they thank all of you for your service here. Um and uh let me see if I have anything specific with regard to so uh one of the comments from I don't
know which council member uh regarding the living shorelines they wanted to uh wait perhaps to see how the adopted tree program uh works out uh which was just uh instituted not too long ago.
Uh and then perhaps at a later date um uh include mangroves in uh in the adopt a tree program filtering waste water or filtering storm water drains. Um
that I think is going to open up a a can of worms similar to our amnesty day where there's a lot more that's involved with it. um primarily maintenance on the filtering mechanisms that are available
for storm water drains. Uh but it's something that they didn't discount or discredit. Uh it's just something that needs more research and and and data. Um probably pricing as well. Um
I don't know. I was going to talk about recycling. Um, I think we are probably pretty close to finalizing what our recycling effort with single stream is
going to be. Um, storm drain signage. uh they were all for. I think the primary response from them was uh identify the storm water drains that the
button has already fallen off or is defaced. Um and you'll see later on in the agenda a couple pictures I took of uh storm drains into country club where that's the case. Um, but they're all for
that. I think it was a positive uh on that. Um, and then the amnesty uh they really like the amnesty day. So, I think if it comes down to uh having to contract with a
private company, um I think that they would at least listen to it. It wouldn't be just a now. But, you know, we have to do a little bit of leg work to come up with uh what they're going to be responsible
for, the private entity and the private contractor and how much it's going to cost. Probably switch the order on those. Um, so that's kind of a a rundown of of
my talk. It's it's online if you want to hear me. I I watched it live on YouTube and I thought you did a great job and they interacted very what's the right word? They were they interacted with you on on many things that you brought up. So that's a
good sign. And they like you said they were very pleased with what we did and thankful for what we do and you did a great job. Yeah, I appreciate it. Thanks for Thank you. Yeah. Thank you. Um so we got a couple things in old business. What I'd like to do because
I'm the chair and I can do this is um I'd like to skip down to future or no I'm sorry any other matters uh and explore the um the addition to that that we motioned to earlier in the
uh in the meeting. Uh did everyone and this relates to uh Marie uh Marie's uh uh discussion with us earlier in the in the meeting? Um
let me see if I did everyone have a chance to read the old ordinance and the proposed new code? I did not. You did not. So, did you did you happen to get an email from
Marie's husband? Yeah. Is it is it your husband? I thought it was sent to the entire uh Well, he he what he wrote to me was that he he tried to send it to my toquesta.org and I wrote him back. I said, "I haven't
had access to toquesta.org for three months." Yeah, I haven't either. That's where it went. And so, I don't know. I bring that up again. I don't know. I saw Brian was in here earlier. I just I can't even get All right. So, I might be the only one
who received it, I guess. Um if they sent it to them, I no way I saw it because I can't get in there. What I will do is But we have some of your the ones that you guys that can't get to.org emails, we have your personal
email, right? Yeah. Yeah. And I think I think Marki did send what he sent toquesta.org to me once he learned that I have no access to toquesta.org I hope the rest of you don't. But I haven't had a time to read what he
sent. But I knew from watching that uh workshop meeting where they brought this subject up was we had some problems. So that's why I wanted to talk about it. That's okay. Um so uh from a process
standpoint, Jay, so that was workshopped what? Last month. Yes. And so the next step would be it would get onto their agenda in a in a in a draft code format. I think I think given the amount of discussion that happened in that
meeting, they're kind of going back to the drawing board a little bit and taking some of that feedback into consideration. Okay. Um so from my understanding, um I don't think they intend to bring anything formally to council until maybe like January.
Okay. Ballpark. Um, so there would be some time for the EAC to provide some input between now and then. All right, perfect. Good. Um, that would also give everyone a opportunity to read both codes unless you you want to
I want to tell you what I freaked out about while I was watching it was the uh uh you know there's Marie touched on it when she spoke earlier. There's no there's nothing wrong with them consolidating things in
the code of ordinances that are just all over the place and bringing it into one simple place to see uh uh to easily understand what's being required. Okay. The uh that's not a
problem for me. permitting, meaning, you know, John and Susan Doe that live at, you know, one main street, if they want to plant something in the rideway, I have no problem with them being required to submit a permit. That's the norm in
the United States. If you want something in the rideway, odds are you're not going to get it. But if you do have the opportunity to get it, you must submit a permit application so the city can know exactly what it is you're doing.
The uh uh I want to tell you in Tquesta Pines where I live, we all have sidewalks. The entire neighborhood has sidewalks. The rideway is roughly 60 ft in width and we all have swailes. Okay?
And they're made the swailes are maintained because they work. Okay? And we have trees. In fact, we are required to have trees in the swale. Okay? um so far. But but Lori Brandon said
something that was spoton and and I I'm I'm going to paraphrase what she said to make this point. And what she said was that all rights of way are not created equal. Basically, she gave
examples into Questa Country Club where she was aware of places where you could easily plant trees without damaging any infrastructure in my neighborhood. Now, at that
workshop, they presented d uh you know, diagrams, let's call it, that showed every type of utility that you can think of all being in the rightway. Okay. Well, that would be very difficult to do
anything in the swale cuz swale is part of the rideway. But using toquesta pines where I live, every property has on the inside, meaning towards their home on the inner edge of the sidewalk
has a 10-foot utility easement. Okay? And in our 10-foot utility easement is the underground Florida Power and Light, underground AT&T and underground Expinity. Okay. So, we don't match the
diagram, the picture, the photograph, whatever it was. We have more space in our ride away than what that diagram showed. So, Lori's right. All rights of way are not created equal. Okay.
And basically what uh the staff member said was this will not happen overnight. So if uh if uh Wade went and got a permit to put in a new driveway and let's say
he didn't have a swale or it was you know hadn't been maintained properly, they're going to make him create that proper slope and swale. Okay? and remove any tree that you may have in your soil.
And that just goes off that what we would end up over time just being a dull and barren place. How can you have rules that end up having no trees, no shade? It just makes no sense.
They have to come up with a way where the utilities and the uh trees can coexist. What's the main purpose for them suggesting or submitting that it just be
barren and sought? What's the main drive for that? They want uh simplicity and the lowest possible cost to access the swale area when construction
of any kind is needed. So a tree is a problematic thing if you want to put in a new storm system in the swale or put in a new electric line or whatever it may be. So not having the tree uh makes it easier
to construct something new and it may and then enforcement thereafter means they don't really need to worry about it in the future when they have to come back in and do something. That's my I think I could be wrong to ship. I'm just and that cost is uh burdened on the city
the what that that additional cost if there's a tree that needs to be removed. Uh who pays that cost? They didn't dive into that, but usually in my experience uh in for example in
Palm Beach the if we if they had a tree in the rideway and we needed to remove it, we removed it at our cost. If they wanted it back, we had to approve that, too, because it's a rideway permit is required in
Palm Beach. Uh but it's it's too bad. you're going to plant a younger tree, but uh it will grow back in time, you know, and these types of utilities, folks, most of them last 50 plus years, so it's not a big deal for that tree to grow back and replant.
Yeah. Can I add something to that? Yeah. So, I could be completely wrong here. I'm not a drainage engineer, but I I do think that one component they they may be considering is is that the trees can impact the effectiveness of the swale
itself. So sometimes they have to come in and and recut the swailes so that they they function a little bit uh they carry a little more water or move the water more quickly. And I think sometimes the trees can impact that. Um again, not the final answer. Right. I
mean, I think you guys would really need to talk to our, you know, our utilities director and public works director, but um there might be a functional purpose as well. So, there's got to be some medium place to meet because that would look
aesthetically atrocious to have just But you you may be right, Jay, but but the question but to have a blanket rule that says no, you can't have a tree in that swale. There may be places where you could put it. And and I'll tell you
something else. You might I know that the public works directors and sometimes the village manager, they're not happy with all of those oak trees we planted back in the day. Um because they, you know, they they make pathways, sidewalks, roadways have
problems. But the village has never implemented an annual root pruning program. They have to root prune or you're going to get uplifted sidewalks and and they just never have done it. We, you know, when we planted them, they
were young and we at towards the end of my tenure here, we started root pruning pruning on Country Club Drive in particular. I remember that. But after after I left, it just did it's not in the budget. They've never done it. And so you get exactly what happens with
roots if you don't root prune. So there are ways to manage all of this stuff and it it's just one size doesn't fit all and they need to have an open mind and we have to look closely at this
ordinance that comes back to see that it's if it's reasonable and it is and that it doesn't create a barren community with no trees in it over time. That's just my opinion. You may not agree it. I'm just letting you know what it looks like at this point.
So in planning, we always like to look at the like context sensitivity of every situation. And I think that's what you're saying, right? You have to look at the specific situation. And so it sounds like, you know, the code is overly prescriptive and doesn't allow you to
look at the context of of what each individual user would be trying to do. So perhaps what we could do is have I I'll get myself in trouble Jeremy or other little shop, but perhaps we could I could get uh utilities director and
public works director to come here and and maybe you know workshop some of these concepts with you before they take it back to village council. Um is that something you guys would like to to have? cuz maybe and and in that meantime if they do come perhaps you can think of some some situations where we would want
to allow a tree to happen. Yeah. Do you know when the next meeting council meeting is regarding this? So so yeah I I think they're from what I understand not going to bring it back until December or January um because
they've they wanted to work on some stuff. So there probably is a little bit of time to to to workshop it and kick it around a little bit. So if if you wanted to, we could we could probably throw it on the November agenda. Yeah. No, I think that would for sure.
Yeah. I think it would give us a lot of information and and detail as to what the driving force here is. Um question. So every permit it seems you can request a variance, right? Um let's say this new
code passes. Wouldn't it just go through that process where you'd apply for a variance and whomever would go out and look at that particular spot and say, "Okay, yeah, you can actually plant an oak tree there or you can."
So, you can't you can't apply for a variance on property that you don't own, right? So, we're we're the owner of the rightway. And so, that's why I think it is important to have a policy. Isn't it 25 ft from the roadway in
in all areas the whole way up? So it's 10. So in a lot of areas it's roadway to the sidewalk and then like Tom you were me mentioning on the other side of the sidewalk is another 10 ft. I think it's a total of 20 25 ft. It I mean it varies throughout the
village the width of the rightway. That's very the other thing I want to say look if you look at this on YouTube and you can go to the village YouTube and it was the last uh workshop meeting I think
and there's lots of confusion. In fact, it could be that some of the things I just told you and the opinions that could all be based on confusion. So, I just I just want to make sure that you know it's a very confusing subject and sometimes they say this and makes you
think they're going to do this and they're not. It's it's crazy, but uh there's a workshop date on here that was September 29th. That sound right, Jen? September 29th. I think that's correct. I can email it to everyone as well.
Thank you. It's also Thank you. Is this wrapped into all the issue, all the concerns with the drainage with all the new construction happening and keeping all the drainage on each lot? And is this kind of together at all?
Not not specifically. It I believe the genesis of it is more people planting uh artificial turf in the rightway. I don't know if that's gotten around to your social circles, but we've had we've had a few situations where that happened and we've we've had code enforcement where we've so we want to establish a formal
policy for what can and cannot go in the right way. Normally and and that's normal. That's it's the norm across America and it's past time to make that the case. But no trees that just is beyond the
pale in my mind. Okay. So, I think if we can get uh public works or utilities to come in next Yeah. I I can't make any promises, but but I'll I'll I'll try to get some some people together. Um but I think we have some time. So, maybe
in the meantime, we all uh go take a look at that YouTube and uh and get caught up on kind of the details and what was discussed at the committee meeting. Um and uh I will send to your private emails and those that
can't get to quested.org. Um the information that was emailed to me. Thank you. Um and then I want to mention something for Jay and all of us. My recollection on us using toquesta.org primarily came from the clerk's office because when we
communicate on EAC matters and we use Questa.org, or she automatically has a copy of it somewhere in case there's a public records request and she has access and can give it to this person that's making the request. It's not
happening right now and I don't know I don't know what to do. Have you spoken to them and let them know that we having some of us are having trouble? I'll I'll circle back with our department about it. Okay. Joe has a question.
I mean I said Marie here um I just wanted so I agree with Mr. Bradford um that it does need to be I my concern with the code text that we were presented with for the council workshop
last week was that it doesn't have that nuance. Um, and I think that the previous ordinance which was passed in 2019 does provide for that. Like it contemplates that your it in the swale guidelines it said a quote low impact
design principles such as bio swailes and other creative storm water management techniques are encouraged. But it also talk speaks to the swale depths and needing to be in comport comport with the original ones which is understandable. We need the swailes.
They work well. But we can make them. The thing I like about the old the current ordinance is that the not the one that's proposed, but the current one that's in in effect now is that by permitting bio swells, so plantings that are designed to slow both slow the water
down before it gets to the storm drain, which I think is important and have seen in my own space happen. um that the water you're not only filtering filtering out grass clippings that are coming from other yards and you're filtering leaves and filtering trash in
some cases and I have a storm drain right next to me. We're we're the filter. Um, so we're stopping it and if it and I have seen conversely when there's just grass next to the storm drain that that doesn't happen and I've w I saw one filled with across the
street from me filled with um grass clippings during a heavy downpour rain that we had. Um, in terms of the code and I I can only I I can I only had the text in front of me when I was doing the that was proposed. Um, so I don't know
what revisions might be in the works. Um but in terms of it not happening overnight um actually as it was written it did require immediate compliance. Um so things that are in the swelles or are in the right of way I I realized the right of way is bigger than the swailes.
Um those would need in theory they are well in in the exact text of the code that was presented would be out of compliance and though under the as the code is written it says those need to be removed. Um, I understand that was maybe
not the intent. Um, but it does need to I think that needs to be made clear that we're actually okay with the trees that are there now because that would I I don't want to see trees I don't want to see hedges that are not causing a problem currently and actually very
unlikely especially with the new materials um to cause a problem because the in researching this the roots aren't actually they're not breaking open the pipes the where when pipes have a leak in them. The trees obviously are going
they'll go into the sewer because there's nutrients there. They'll go into the water because they're looking for water. Um but it's not the tree impacting the pipe, it's that the pipe already had a problem, a weak a material's weakness. Um so I think especially with our new pipes, that's
much less of a risk. So for the trees there um and on enforcement actually that one in one there are provisions here where the resident would pay this the village could take things out and the resident would be responsible for the cost. Um and the other thing I
wanted to add to note is that I do think it's important um I know at Cornell there's been a lot of their um school has had a been work done a lot of work on bioils that's very interesting um especially the use of not just wild flowersowers but shrubs and trees and
street trees both not only protecting the infrastructure and keeping the water in place and also filtering it and helping infiltrate but um so they make the swailes function better. But there is there's also studies that show in terms of protecting infrastructure that
your street trees that shade the asphalt cause roads to be repay need repaving less frequently, which is a benefit that we'd be stripping if we took the trees out. So I just really would not like to lose trees or a lot of the other beneficial plants. And I think we can do
this definitely. So, uh, since you came back up a question, um, with regard, well, I agree with the trees and the tree canopy. Um, and it also makes for a more comfortable walk, uh, in the middle of the day. Uh, my question with regard to
vegetation that's planted, especially in the swale area. Um, okay. So there's an allowance of a tree or a of a a shrub or a plant from the the list that is uh is allowable at
least in Tquesta. Um is there any engineering that's done because you you'd mentioned okay well you know you kind of want to collect the water there and it it does filter and I know the the benefits absolutely of that happening
before it goes into the storm water drain. But sometimes too much pooling is a bad thing. Um, and I don't know like just saying, okay, well, we can plant this sort of plant right here. Who is some
does someone do that engineering to make sure that it doesn't slow it up too much? So, you know, you're flooding the front of your house and and creating problems for you and your neighbors and everything else. I I don't know the answer. You may not know the answer
either, but it's something that just popped in my head. I'm like, well, I know the benefits of of that pooling and that filtration, but there's got to be a drawback somewhere in an maybe maybe it's an extreme case, right?
You know, but I I don't Yeah. Um, so I'd have to look into that more for you. I mean, my background is in is in the law. Um but the I I think that there I I believe that that work has been done and in the there's a lot
of if you type in bio swales right like you'll find a lot of places that have been working on that to try and help infiltrate water in place. Um and yes I understand I think I do think the pooling um is part it you don't want it
backing up but you also don't you want properties to hold water as well. um rather than rush stuff to the storm drain. And I think when you're going to see that I would guess would be um that seed backup is when the storm drains are full there's going to be
things held but that's not going to you're you're going to have that problem if you have solid swailes too. Um and trees also I think a tree I think that there are definitely in studies on tree street trees um they do help keep
water. Not only do they absorb it themselves, but they even hold them on their canopy. I mean, I was just looking at the sea grapes. They're holding they must be holding gallons of water just on their leaves after a rain event. Um, that's not even getting to the storm to the ground.
I think we as a committee need to do some homework in the next month before we come back next next month. Yeah. Um because there's a lot that kind of can go into it. Yeah. A lot of detail. Well, thank you very much. I appreciate you coming back.
Thank you. The other thing I had under any other matters was to ask Jay if I think two months ago I brought up section 78- three I can't even read uh 395 which
requires a 10ft barrier not a barrier but landscape lowmaintenance area along the shoreline of any property. Did did you hear anything back from Wayne as to
whether he was enforcing this rule now? I apologize. I forgot. I'll make a note to follow up with him and and uh get some information to you about that. Okay, that's great. That's all I had. All right. So, this we'll do this very
quickly. The old business hazardous waste amnesty day. I think we talked about that. Um, in my mind, I think the probably the next logical step would be to um, engage with a private contractor
um, that can manage the whole process and find out what their costs are, what the operations, the whole what they do, what the cost is. Get maybe like three of them if they're available. Yeah. Present it to present it to Junior.
save because we're we're not a department. We can't you know we have to go through a department to get yes get funding. But I will say like I said in the very beginning um council was and everyone on council was uh was excited
about that one and again probably the most it may be just a specialty item. We won't be covering the entire hazardous waste waste options just to get it going. Yeah. you know, and and identify what which items would be the most um
the top two, three, maybe five household hazardous wastes that are most common, you know, probably batteries, probably paint, um maybe oils, you know, uh and just start small and and see what the uh
see if it it can have or grow legs. And even that offering that to a community brings awareness that the facility is Yeah. You know, be an opportunity to You were going to say something, Jay. Putting my government bureaucrat hat on
here. Um, they did love the idea of it as like a volunteer event. I'm not We don't know how they would support it if it if it's going to cost, you know, $10,000. So, we'll find out. We'll have to We'll find that out. They like the idea, but they love the idea as a as a
volunteer event. I didn't catch that part. As a volunteer, who's going to volunteer to collect hazardous waste? Well, no. I mean, as a as a free as a free event, like so the paper the paper cleanup thing that we do is free, right? So, um presuming that it would be a like
that like S swa if somebody would come out here that they also weren't aware that there's an S SWA pickup facility. It's a 10-minute drive away. So they may not be as supportive of paying $10,000 so that people can save a 5minute drive.
It's not 5 minutes. If you're if if you're in the country if you're in the right house. So if you're if there's no traffic, it's a 12minut drive from here to to the facility over there takes me
in the morning. I mean that's Google that's Google Maps. But if you lived in the country club, it'd take you 5 minutes just to get to Questa Park, which is where we'd probably have the the pickup event. So, I'm just I'm just playing devil's advocate here. Um because it they may
not be all in on on money. No, I get that. I get that. But, um you know, it's better than them just saying, "No, this is an idiotic idea right from the get go." So, let them tell us no.
Um, but they al also did like the storm water drain. Oh, any any other comments about that? Storm water drain signage. Um, they were all on board with that as well. Uh, I don't know who would be the person that would go around. I mean, I I
walk my dog into Questa Country Club. I found two that don't have the signage. If that's the idea, then I mean, if you guys want to do something fun, you could split the village up into districts and and see how many you can find that don't have them.
And if we do that, there will be budget to put that signage back on. I think we actually already have extra the extra buttons already in in stock. What about something a bit more um how
should I put it? Conspicuous or would it be incon? Yeah, that's so that's a that's a whole different discussion. Um because then we'd have to design that and figure out which ones you'd want to put those on. So I think that's a whole another discussion for you guys to have. You know, years ago when this board was
created early on, we wanted to send letters to permitted or what's the right word to landscapers that are operating in into Quest and uh we got a list. We were shocked at how scrawny the list
was. There's only like eight people had permits to actually operate into Quest itself. But uh that's one thing too is I mean yeah let's figure out how many we don't we need and put somewhere but we
need to let the landscapers also know hey look you know do tell your workers not to put clippings into the uh storm drains in the river. I see an opportunity for community involvement with the buttons.
Yeah. to create um some type of activity of identify the buttons and text it in or whatever and get a $5 Starbucks gift card or you know something or some other but I see an opportunity there to make it a uh a fun community opportunity
and it kind of gives ownership to awareness instead of just having public works go and identifying the dome now the community is aware of Okay. All right. There's got to be an easier way. You want to like scour around on
into Questa. Wouldn't you utilities have like I know that they do maintenance on those things. I've seen the guys sucking out I don't know whatever vacuuming out the storm drains.
I can I can talk to them about it. Um there's always a challenge with having advisory boards basically directing staff to do to do tasks, right? So it's typically not how government functions. So if if I go to the public works
director and say, "Hey, the EAC wants you guys to go scour every every manhole in in the village." They say, "I we're over staffed right now. I don't you know, so it's it's a it's a challenge." You frame the question a little differently.
Yeah. How many Ask them if they have noticed if any of the buttons have been ripped off or defaced or damaged if they remember. Like I I don't know how often they go out there and and uh
vacuum those storm drains out. But maybe they don't. And if that's the if that's the answer, fine. I don't I'm not going to direct anyone. I you know, this is a advisory committee, right? But um it sure beats I mean I I can do my little area where I walk my dogs but you know
that's like that's like four streets of Tquesta country club and we have two other committee members that live in Tquesta country club. That's why I see an opportunity for community involvement. You divide it up into areas and then prevent uh present
some type of uh reward. I'll use the word re or incentive um to get people walking their dogs, notice them, text in the location or whatever. Again, it brings awareness to it
and not just a maintenance situation. I like the idea of bringing people's awareness to what a storm drain is, number one, and what its function is and how it affects our um environment. But, you know, it's the norm
for a storm water utility to know how many storm drain inlets do we have and got how many of them do and do not have these buttons. That's it may be something they already know.
They they know how many storm drains they have. Um, I don't think they would know how many are missing, but but I I'll send an email to the village manager and to the utilities director basically directing them to do this. And to Michelle's point, it might it might
actually be a good opportunity to to explain to the public what what they're for and and why we don't want people to flush things down. And at the same time, say, "Hey, by the way, if you've noticed that your storm drains don't have these,
please send an email to so and so the show to chair Brad Freeze. U that's fine. So, but yeah, I No, I just I know that they're they're they're really swamped with work right now. So, I'm I'm not trying to be difficult. I just um but
but yeah, we can we can um start having a dialogue with them about that for sure. Wanted our committee to go out and show us how to apply them. Yeah, we could do it. We just glue that thing on there. Gorilla glue. I'm assuming that's all. We're working around a challenge that we
need to challenge. Go ahead. I'm not sure, but I think if somebody from the board called Lockach and Con, I think they have a map of all of them, don't they? Somebody has a map. Well, they they were the ones who pushed this whole thing.
I think I think if you called and asked for a map of where all of them are in Tquesta, they could provide that and wouldn't have to pull Sure. You're talking about Lockachi district, the the river district. Okay. EnCon was part of that whole thing back then putting
them. Yeah, you're you're right. They they they spearheaded the whole thing. And I don't know think I'm not sure about what these buttons are that you're talking about, but they um they might not be able to tell you about that, but
that's something, you know, you can just walk around and see it. I'm getting text education in the newsletter would be great just to mention those storm drains every every couple of years because the dog walkers put their poop bags into the
drains and it's really bad and the fish catchers kill and clean their or they were for a while killing doing their fish clean them and putting it down the drains. Okay. Yeah. Yeah, I like the community opportunity to It's just an education though. It often
helps in that newsletter. Wonderful. Okay. I'm getting live text from Marjorie who who who does watch the meetings a lot of the times live. FYI, she said she would love to know where the missing discs are and that said that they do replace them when they're when
they're missing. So, so they do that actively, but but um there's so many in the village that I I think that they probably don't don't have an exact number for that. But um I'll circle back with her and see if they could they could make it a priority. So okay. So the next step then would be
if I'll call Lux Hatry uh River District and see if they have a map of all the storm water drains. Um then it just becomes a matter of whomever. Uh I bet our that Marjorie probably has that. She might they do have that
prior to the the director before Marjorie. I forgot his name. Matt something. Um he did he he did uh GPS coordinates for every the the distribution line for the for
the drainage as well as where were the uh inlets located. I don't know if he ended up being a he did it for my neighborhood, but I don't know if he was able to finish it before he left for the whole village because I can remember him sending me an
email and said, "Hey, Tom, can you verify that I got this right from my neighborhood?" You know, like uh and it was like a map with a a dot and a code. The code that told you what that was inlet or so
someone's done the work. Yeah. So, it may exist margin. They they do have a map of the storm water drain, so they know every single one. Thanks for here's here's course of action. It's a little late to get things into to smoke
signals. The deadline is Monday, but I we could probably make it work to put in a little blurb and in smoke signals that has a picture of the of the inlets and do a little bit of education. say, "Hey, did FYI, did you know that you know your storm water goes to the Lockxahhatchee? Please be mindful." You know, all the
best practices stuff that I think we've talked about. And then um perhaps we'll I'll put a little thing in there that says, you know, if you've if you've noticed a storm drain that's that's missing one, please contact the village and we'll replace it. So that way Brad's
not having to scour the village. And you know, the public works department, you know, also they can probably make an effort, but they may not they may not see every single one. All right. All right. Anything else on that? No contest.
You're welcome to head that subcommittee up. Okay. Uh any general comments? I have a question for the board. Um do you after seeing the presentation, are you still interested in pursuing
single string? I don't see well my opinion I don't see how there's a forward. They She put the hammer down. It's not happening. Yeah. I don't think it was necessarily her. I think it was their infrastructure is set up for dual strength.
Well, yes, but okay. I asked the question because I have a motive. I asked the question because I know how to do it and I know exactly all of the steps where I'm not saying that this this step can let's say it was eight
steps to to be able to make it happen. I'm not saying that it will end up being successful and that we would be able to do it. I'm just telling I know the steps that are necessary in order to do it. And I'll just
briefly tell you how. Um, first of all, you've got to find out from the staff andor elected officials if it's if it's doable, would they be open to it and that you would volunteer, we, me,
whoever would volunteer to do the leg work. Okay, here's what we know. Martin County uses single stream. In other words, all of their recycling goes into one bin and is co-mingled and then processed. Okay? So, you have on our our
next door neighbor is doing what some of us would like to do. And a large portion if not all of Martin County is served by Waste Management, the same company we do. You heard the girl that gave this S
swa presentation say that Lakew Worth Beach was not part of the program, but then they had this hiccup and they became part you can also get out of the program with Palm Beach County
and let's so that mean okay so if the council or the staff say yeah okay go explore it and come back and see if it's feasible. So you first you've got to go to waste management and say what would the cost be if you picked up all of our
recycling and took it to the Martin County facility instead of the Palm Beach County facility. They might end up being no cost change whatsoever. I don't know where the Martin County facilities located although I can remember driving
by a mountain on the turnpike. But I I hate to interrupt, but I thought the sorting facility for the recyclables for Mark County was even further north. Like I thought it I I'd have to remember. I don't I don't remember exactly where,
but it was a significant distance from here. Um somewhat significant from Martin County, but it was, I believe, outside the county, but further north. I could be wrong. It's just something I remembered at one of our but that would be a cost factor. So we
need to identify the cost factors and and one of them is transport transporting the recyclables to the facility that can process. So you know it's not a it's not a walk in the park to go from here to uh uh what do you
call it military mil is it the Donald Ross military area. I mean you know it's takes me 30 minutes to get through Jupiter sometimes. there in 2 minutes. Uh so but anyway, so what if Martin count
what if what if they said the price would be the same to transport to either or and what if Martin County said yes, we will allow you to to trans do that and put your recycle start if you enter into an intergovernmental agreement.
It's nothing more than a contract between governments. Okay? And it says uh well first of all you tell SWA we're out and then you go and you have a contract with Martin County's SWA if they have one and then they'll come and
pick it up and it'll go voice manager will pick it up. They'll take it to Martin County. Now the question really is do you want to go through all of that? I mean, I I know how to do all that stuff because I've done it, you know, scores of times in my career. But do you really want to
go to the trouble is my question after you've seen this today? The bottom line to me is, does it increase participation? So, our first presenter months ago said yes, 30%. You were trying to drive that question today
to get that feedback. Does it increase participation basically? And where we didn't really get that from her uh presentation was that the product is less contaminated by doing dual stream
and that makes it a marketable product for them to to sell. So those are two different concepts of one versus the other not an apple and apple and orange and orange. Yeah. One might give you greater participation but the other may be more economically viable.
Right. Right. Right. And at the end of it, I think it's what's the net result? Like is the net outcome? Well, better or worse. I think the net outcome is there's less recyclable trash in our community, right?
Or in our garbage, right? I mean, you want it recycled. I mean, Yep. That's what that's the end goal. Yeah. And to know exactly what's recyclable that's turning up in garbage because people don't want to recycle in a dual way
is they just that's that was a data point she was unaware of. But is it the single stream she said causes people to put more of their just garbage in there so then that contamination does that
bring down the percentage of what is recycled? So, right, which is what you ask. Yeah. So, you don't know like at the end you want more recyclables, right? Is contamination up front but more participation yield more recyclables or is it the opposite to you know what
we're doing today? But I think your your point is that maybe we should ask the question, we are on the county line. I mean, we're close in proximity. It makes more sense than a Lake Worth. You know, they would have to span pretty much a whole county before
they're out of the county. Sure. So for us at least we're close in proximity and if the the the organization that picks it up waste management I presume that they have you know they're they're running dual trucks obviously for garbage and recyclables
their truck is split in two. Is that right? um in terms of the two types of recycling is yeah sure I'm never what I don't know is from their perspective if if one side fills up in their truck they continue their route or
they have to take their truck back versus if they were just to fill the entire truck up to capacity with a one not only yeah I'm sorry not only that waste management said I mean the I remember this clear as day as well that
there it's less you FTEES because it's automated similar to how our garbage like our general garbage is now you got the claw and it lifts it up and dumps it. The same thing occurs with a single stream recycle. Yeah. So you don't have that guy
with picking up a bunch of Yeah. Um cardboard. You're right. So I don't I mean let's back to your back to point number one. Sorry guys. Is there is there buying
That was the one area where there I think in general there was agreement that oh that it sounds like a great idea. The one person on that council, the mayor, um was the one that kind of pushed back
the most. Um well, we're not going to be able to sell it to them unless we do more. This might actually be the first step is we have to research does it end up with with a net increase in recycling.
Right now if we can make a comp if it didn't we probably wouldn't make the case. That's right. Well, how would we do that? We've had waste management here. We've had SWA here. Waste management I mean said total amount collected is 30 plus%.
But the net amount at the end of you know taking the contaminants out etc. is it more or less? No one knows the answer. I don't know like where do you get that? Is there a scientific journal article that has that start with Google and see where it takes
you? All right. I wonder if Martin County has some benchmarking results on hey here's how what's our participation rate in Martin County for recycling. What's our participation? And and I know right they were dual initially. They were Martin County. Yeah.
And so they must have data from dual to single. Maybe they made a case and maybe it might be a a good outline for us to follow fill in our own data. It's worth knowing. It's worth contacting them. It's worth knowing this information and um
it should all be public record. I mean Palm Beach County puts it on their website and stuff like that. So maybe they do the same. All right, we're running way long. Okay, so thank you for bringing that up.
Um, so it's I'll say I mean it's not a dead issue. I I really am I I wanted single stream cycling. Another variable that's part of the equation too is we we now learned what Palm Beach County does. you know,
they're turning their uh let's just the portion of their waste into electricity. Does Martin County do the same thing? You know, or what do they do? They just make a bigger bigger landfill. Yeah. That energy production from what I
re think I heard her say is not from the recycle materials that'll get sold. The energy production is from the incinerated proc incineration process. Yeah, that's true. the collecting of the steam. All right.
Well, I mean, homework. I'll do some I'll do some research as best I can. We can all noodle it, too. Just a little deeper. I think we should all poke around on it. Yep. Okay. And, you know, it may end up Okay. Let's just leave it. D. Yeah. We need to know before we kill it, I think.
Yeah. All right. Sounds good. Uh, any other comments? General comments, future agenda items for those that didn't I don't know. Did uh did I send the staff memo to those
that don't have the toqua.org? Did you I couldn't hear what you said. What? Um did I send a the staff memo the template for staff memo? Did you receive it via email? I don't I don't remember. What is it?
I don't remember. It's just a template, a summary it up. It's a future agenda items. All you have to do is attach your name, put a subject, and a short summary of what you'd like to discuss so it makes it onto the agenda. Okay.
Okay. I'll I'll Yeah, you can put Are you saying you sent it on September 29th? No, I'm just going to email you guys. I mean, I already did. I emailed you. I don't know when it was last week.
September 29th. What is when you sent it? Did you do? I did, but I thought I put your personal one in there. I may have not. I'll I'll circle back and make sure that your personal emails are in there. And you two are the only ones that It was.org. You sent it to
I've been This has been going for two years. Over to Tech twice. They couldn't He couldn't figure it out. It was something to do. We All right, so we're about to adjourn, but I don't know if you had a chance to take a look at these great pictures of
storm drain signage that I pulled off the internet. I'd love to see the quest to have something like this, but apparently we have we have them. It's a button. We have a button. It's about this.
That's what my button looks like. Yeah, that's about it. And that's the one right across from it. Nothing. There's nothing there. This one needs to be I don't know. Some repair work maybe that needs to be done. Are you saying that one across the street from you just faded away sort of?
There's so many of them in Questa Country Club that are like that. Yeah. They just kind of fade and but I like all of these other ones. I think they're they'll catch your attention more than those. Yeah, they're more prominent. But we'll
do the we'll do the button thing. I guess this one's stamped into the concrete. But anyway, this one it's a stencil like that. You just spray painted on. Yeah, that's nice. It's not true. So,
there's other options out there. Maybe once we exhaust these buttons we you know what you guys could do is so when you go to present to council next probably in like January February before the strategic planning session you could put that on on the radar of something
that you want maybe some budget for for in next fiscal year cuz there there' be an expense to that right so um you could that's what I did already yeah but it wasn't in the context of like no I said
drain signage around storm water drains. Yeah, but it wasn't in a leadup to the strategic planning session. You just kind of said, "These are things we're interested in doing. Are you guys good with these?" But they're going to want like very specific like, "Hey, you know, we want we want money for the the
mangrove program. We want money for uh enhanced strain signage." So So you could you could I think you get another bite at the apple on that one. Okay. All right. Anyway, sounds sounds good.
Yeah, that's it. Any other matters? Okay. Uh, make a motion to adjurnn. Second. Second. Yep. All those in favor. I no names. So as an advisory one request