MAHONING COUNTY Officials OK contracts for tire, battery disposal
By BOB JACKSON
VINDICATOR COURTHOUSE REPORTER
YOUNGSTOWN -- Mahoning County commissioners approved contracts Thursday for disposal of discarded tires and household batteries.
Browning-Ferris Industries will haul away the used tires, and Battery Solutions of Michigan will dispose of the batteries. Each company will be paid $7,500 for a year.
John Cox, recycling division assistant director, said tires are ones found along roads or in ditches. They are picked up by township road crews and taken to the county engineer's office on Industrial Road, where BFI picks them up for disposal.
BFI takes the tires to a landfill that is used only for tires, Cox said.
It's part of a tire disposal program the recycling division has run the past four years. Cox said about 6,000 tires have been taken away each year. Only tires dropped off by township road crews are accepted.
Event planned: Cox said the recycling division is planning a "tire amnesty day" later this year, though a date has not been set. Residents will be able to take used tires to a designated drop-off site in their township, where the recycling division will arrange to have them picked up.
Those tires will be recycled and used for such projects as paving with a crumb-rubber paving material, Cox said.
The recycling division started its battery recycling program last year and collected about 3,500 pounds of batteries at 35 drop-off points around the county, mostly at public libraries, Cox said.
The batteries are taken back to Michigan and recycled for use in new batteries, he said.
bjackson@vindy.com