2014-12-04 Cost of Government Commission Minutes

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stations where we have to pump things through and that’s where we get electricity costs and then you have to have redundancy because in the event of the electricity going out Dora has generators that she has to haul out in some cases, some places we have the generator there, but in some places she has to haul the generators out so that we can avoid sewage spills. Mr. Mitchell: Thank you very, very much. Mr. Matsuda: Lastly, I just have a question and this is regarding green waste. I understand that the green waste people are subcontracted there? They’re not… Ms. Leithead-Todd: They’re not County employees, they’re subcontracted. We issue usually either a bid or an RFP every so many years and then we get an outside contractor to handle that. Mr. Matsuda: Alright, so it’s, they’re bidding for, so we’re getting some revenues? Ms. Leithead-Todd: Typically we pay. I think we’re paying, we’re paying less than what it would cost the tipping fee. Mr. Matsuda: Okay. Ms. Leithead-Todd: And then I think the real question is when will the County move towards looking at composting as oppose to just mulch. And part of that is in Hilo, typically as much mulch as we produce, people come pick it up its gone. What’s happening on the other side of the island is that we’ve got too much mulch and so we’ve actually been hauling mulch back to Hilo which is why some people were a little surprise that they saw some mounds of mulch in Hilo because usually it disappears and that’s because we’ve been hauling it back from the other side of the island. So one of the things that we’re looking at and we’re hoping to start in the next fiscal year, that would be the fiscal 15 – 16 year is to see if we can do small grinders, get a contract for small grinders at some of our transfer stations. So in other words, if we could do that in Ka‘ū, we wouldn’t have to haul the green, we would avoid the cost of hauling the green waste to Pu‘uanahulu. People would bring their green waste let’s say to Wai‘ōhinu as a potential example. We would periodically take a small grinder out there, we would grind it there and then the mulch would be available to people in Ka‘ū. If we can do that in different parts of the island, then we avoid the hauling cost so it’s more efficient for us, it means that we would be able to provide mulch to more people in more remote locations than we currently, currently now you either have to go to Kealakehe, Pu‘uanahulu or to the Hilo landfill area to get mulch. It would also potentially I think quiet the concerns over hauling bugs and pests from one part of the island to another if we can farm this out. So that’s one thing that we’re trying to put into next year’s budget and we think that it will both save us some money, but also provide more service to the public in the long run. Mr. Perry: How many places will there be then? 11