Trash Disposal

HOWARD COUNTY'S TRASH makes a pit stop in Annapolis Junction before it travels to a landfill in Kings County, Va. In Annapolis Junction, workers load waste from small trucks onto larger ones at a trash transfer station that is the handoff point before the trip to Virginia. The facility, owned by Houston-based USA Waste, is the only transfer site of its kind in the area.And that may be a problem.Indeed, Howard County benefits from USA Waste's low fees. The company last year easily beat competitors in bidding for the county's residential trash disposal for the next six years.

For six years, the County Commissioners have wrestled with how to handle the county's long-term needs for disposing of solid waste.A Friday symposium on solid waste was intended to aid the commissioners and public works officials in deciding about the future of trash disposal in the county.Both county landfills -- Northern, east of Westminster, and Hoods Mill, in Woodbine -- will be at capacity in 20 years."It's a forum to bring together those technologies that have been looked at and studied and let the commissioners, the community and county staff hear what they have to offer us and why we should select their technology," said Gary Horst, the county's deputy director of public works.

For six years, the County Commissioners have wrestled with how to handle the county's long-term needs for disposing of solid waste.A Friday symposium on solid waste was intended to aid the commissioners and public works officials in deciding about the future of trash disposal in the county.Both county landfills -- Northern, east of Westminster, and Hoods Mill, in Woodbine -- will be at capacity in 20 years."It's a forum to bring together those technologies that have been looked at and studied and let the commissioners, the community and county staff hear what they have to offer us and why we should select their technology," said Gary Horst, the county's deputy director of public works.

It's high time the county commissioners made a decision on how the county will collect and dispose of its waste in the future, some of Carroll's town officials told them yesterday."

Among decisions and orders issued by the Supreme Court yesterday:RULINGSFBI files. The court ruled unanimously that the FBI has no legal right to keep secret the files it has of every interview by agents during a criminal investigation. The court, ruling in a New Jersey policeman's murder case, said the FBI must justify keeping secret any reports on interviews when it gave no specific promise of confidentiality to the source. .CASES TO BE HEARDJudicial bias. The court said it would review, in its next term starting in October, a claim by a Baltimore peace activist, his brother in California and a Catholic priest from Georgia that a federal judge was biased against them and should have been disqualified from their trial for splattering blood at an Army education center at Fort Benning, Ga., in 1990.

As the probable price of cleaner air, the Baltimore region can expect a jumble of changes in everything from trash disposal to the type of propellant in your household bug spray.The reason: Besides cars and commuting, ozone-fighters are pursuing many other sources of the emissions that cause smog. They include landfills, paint, cosmetics, household cleansers and even bakeries, yeast manufacturers and printing shops.Taxpayers aren't likely to feel a big pinch soon. But some companies may have to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars equipment.

A citizen panel studying Anne Arundel County's future trash disposal alternatives has recommended construction of a waste-to-energy incinerator, either in the county, or jointly with a neighboring jurisdiction.The incinerator was the centerpiece of a set of recommendations the committee presented yesterday to County Executive Robert R. Neall. The other recommendations included encouraging more recycling of trash and construction debris, composting and regular disposal of household hazardous waste.

Howard County may have found some real allies in its battle against trash, members of the county's Solid Waste Advisory Committee were told last night.Seven members of the 15-member committee were briefed on efforts by Baltimore City and other metropolitan area counties to collaborate on solutions to the problem of finding ways to recycle and dispose of solid waste."There is a real sense among the participants that these regional ideas have to be pursued," said John O'Hara, chief of Howard's Bureau of Environmental Services.

County officials yesterday detailed Carroll's trash disposal efforts during the second meeting of a recently appointed waste-to-energy committee.The county last year generated some 122,000 tons of trash and recycled about 10 percent of that volume, Keith Kirschnick, public works director, told the committee.The committee is studying incineration as a disposal method to augment recycling and landfilling.About 28 percent of the county's trash was dumped at the Hoods Mill landfill in South Carroll and 72 percent was buried at the Northern landfill off Route 140, just east of Westminster, Mr. Kirschnick said.

Anne Arundel officials, who spurned use of Baltimore's BRESCO incinerator 10 years ago, now are looking at the possibility of building their own trash-to-energy plant.A draft plan outlining the county's trash disposal needs for the next 20 years concludes that relying exclusively on landfills is no longer adequate. It says the county needs more recycling and facilities that either compost trash or burn it.No longer is there "going to be some magic hole in the ground where everything goes," said Richard Waesche with the county Department of Utilities.

An Ulman administration bill seeking to shift recycling expenses into the county's trash budget could lead to higher fees for residents. The measure would move recycling collection costs from the general budget to a dedicated trash fund supported by a $175 annual fee paid by taxpayers. In addition to combining similar functions, the purpose is to raise awareness and use of recycling, County Executive Ken Ulman said. "What goes from your house to the curb should be in the same fee," Ulman said this week.

The city is embarking on the second phase of a struggling effort to combat rats attracted to the garbage illegally dumped throughout the city. The Board of Estimates approved $320,000 yesterday to buy 55,334 trash cans that will be distributed directly to residents who will also receive information on proper trash disposal from the Mayor's Office of Neighborhoods. Since December the city has distributed nearly 55,000 of the same black trash cans, bearing the word "Believe," to the neighborhoods of Oliver, Washington Village, Park Heights and Sandtown/Winchester.

HOWARD COUNTY'S TRASH makes a pit stop in Annapolis Junction before it travels to a landfill in Kings County, Va. In Annapolis Junction, workers load waste from small trucks onto larger ones at a trash transfer station that is the handoff point before the trip to Virginia. The facility, owned by Houston-based USA Waste, is the only transfer site of its kind in the area.And that may be a problem.Indeed, Howard County benefits from USA Waste's low fees. The company last year easily beat competitors in bidding for the county's residential trash disposal for the next six years.

For six years, the County Commissioners have wrestled with how to handle the county's long-term needs for disposing of solid waste.A Friday symposium on solid waste was intended to aid the commissioners and public works officials in deciding about the future of trash disposal in the county.Both county landfills -- Northern, east of Westminster, and Hoods Mill, in Woodbine -- will be at capacity in 20 years."It's a forum to bring together those technologies that have been looked at and studied and let the commissioners, the community and county staff hear what they have to offer us and why we should select their technology," said Gary Horst, the county's deputy director of public works.

For six years, the County Commissioners have wrestled with how to handle the county's long-term needs for disposing of solid waste.A Friday symposium on solid waste was intended to aid the commissioners and public works officials in deciding about the future of trash disposal in the county.Both county landfills -- Northern, east of Westminster, and Hoods Mill, in Woodbine -- will be at capacity in 20 years."It's a forum to bring together those technologies that have been looked at and studied and let the commissioners, the community and county staff hear what they have to offer us and why we should select their technology," said Gary Horst, the county's deputy director of public works.

It's high time the county commissioners made a decision on how the county will collect and dispose of its waste in the future, some of Carroll's town officials told them yesterday."

A citizen panel studying Anne Arundel County's future trash disposal alternatives has recommended construction of a waste-to-energy incinerator, either in the county, or jointly with a neighboring jurisdiction.The incinerator was the centerpiece of a set of recommendations the committee presented yesterday to County Executive Robert R. Neall. The other recommendations included encouraging more recycling of trash and construction debris, composting and regular disposal of household hazardous waste.

As the probable price of cleaner air, the Baltimore region can expect a jumble of changes in everything from trash disposal to the type of propellant in your household bug spray.The reason: Besides cars and commuting, ozone-fighters are pursuing many other sources of the emissions that cause smog. They include landfills, paint, cosmetics, household cleansers and even bakeries, yeast manufacturers and printing shops.Taxpayers aren't likely to feel a big pinch soon. But some companies may have to spend hundreds of thousands of dollars equipment.

Among decisions and orders issued by the Supreme Court yesterday:RULINGSFBI files. The court ruled unanimously that the FBI has no legal right to keep secret the files it has of every interview by agents during a criminal investigation. The court, ruling in a New Jersey policeman's murder case, said the FBI must justify keeping secret any reports on interviews when it gave no specific promise of confidentiality to the source. .CASES TO BE HEARDJudicial bias. The court said it would review, in its next term starting in October, a claim by a Baltimore peace activist, his brother in California and a Catholic priest from Georgia that a federal judge was biased against them and should have been disqualified from their trial for splattering blood at an Army education center at Fort Benning, Ga., in 1990.

Howard County may have found some real allies in its battle against trash, members of the county's Solid Waste Advisory Committee were told last night.Seven members of the 15-member committee were briefed on efforts by Baltimore City and other metropolitan area counties to collaborate on solutions to the problem of finding ways to recycle and dispose of solid waste."There is a real sense among the participants that these regional ideas have to be pursued," said John O'Hara, chief of Howard's Bureau of Environmental Services.