Proposal Meeting

Meeting | 90 Minutes | September 3

The second plan was presented to:

The goal of this meeting was to try and get the city on board. The DNR and Jennifer Trent were present so that Makayla could get real time answers to regulation and special compost questions. After weeks of back and forth emails that ate up the summer months, it was time to come to a conclusion and move everyone to the same page.

After briefing everyone on the current proposed plan, custodian involvement was approved. The next point of discussion was seeing where the city was at with their role.

The city was not able to agree because:

• The city compost site currently only takes yard waste which does not require the same maintenance as a food waste site. Considering that, the city turns/mixes their site twice a year. To increase the schedule of which they turn the compost, it would not be realistic cost wise nor legitimately.

• Furthermore, they do not have the proper fencing for a food waste compost site. The addition would be doable, but this was the lowest of the barriers.

• The city was concerned about how the school was going to accurately regulate contamination (plastic or silverware) coming from the cafeteria that would then be spread with the finished compost.

• The city compost site was was within 500 feet of residential areas

• There was no realistic way to transport the food waste from the school, through town, to the compost site.

Moving past this, it took about an hour to determine the next move. This is when In-Vessel composting was brought up. This would allow West Delaware to bypass regulations that were holding them back. Additionally, meat and dairy could be included because it is an enclosed system so we would not have to worry about reducing smell.

The meeting was left on a not of hope and Makayla was sent off to explore In-Vessel Composting options for West Delaware.