Recycling Recycling

It seems the Athens-Hocking Solid Waste District is out of compliance with Ohio EPA. Still. And the district says they need more money in order to fix this. There's a shocker. But there's something smelly about this whole thing and it isn't the trash.

It all started over two decades ago with HB 592...

1988 - HB 592 was passed that created solid waste districts in the state because we weren't recycling enough and the landfills were filling up. The Ohio EPA gets to oversee the districts and tell them how to do things. Problem #1. Since it is a government entity, tax dollars pay for it. Problem #2.

In 2009, the Athens-Hocking Solid Waste District said they needed more money. To generate this money, they proposed a 'fee' of $3/ton of waste. A tax by any other name is still a tax. Call it a fee if it makes you feel better but it's still a tax. This tax would be levied on the trash haulers and will of course be passed on to their customers with rate increases.

But the tax must be approved by the county commissioners for each county, city council of the largest city in each county, and legislative authorities representing a combined population of at least 60 percent of the total population in each county. Athens loves paying taxes but the great people of Hocking County evidently do not. Logan City Council wouldn't pass it and neither would the county commissioners. It seems they had questions that were either not answered or were answered inadequately. Thank you to the elected officials in Hocking County for not playing the part of ostrich.

After a few months, the district recycled their plan to implement the $3 fee. Well, that is their business. Sort of. Hocking County again to the rescue. Questions gone unanswered concerning the finances of the district kept the Hocking County elected officials from approving the added tax.

Now Athens wants to take their ball and go home. The landfill used by the two counties is in Athens County. It's really close to the Athens/Hocking line though and wouldn't surprise me if some of it were located in Hocking County. Athens wants to break up with Hocking. The problem is that in order for a solid waste district to be a single county, that county must have a population of 100,000. Neither county meets that requirement and the Ohio EPA would have to approve the split. Hocking County would be left high and dry according to the threats made by the Athens County Commissioners. There's other stuff to it within the original bill that I am having a difficult time making heads or tails out of because it involves government speak and I'm not fluent in idiot.

The Ohio EPA says the Athens-Hocking District is not in compliance. I'm not sure exactly what that means but based on various newspaper articles dating back to February of 2010, we need to recycle more or maybe we need to generate more trash. I'm not sure. They want people to recycle but the county gets more money if we generate more trash. Since it's more money the county wants, do they want us to generate more trash? But the EPA says recycle.... makes my head spin....

The state says there is a partnership between public and private entities but at least a few of the private trash haulers don't exactly see it that way. They see it as the public side is pushing the private side out of business by causing the private haulers to raise rates. I can tell you that we pay almost twice as much out here in the county as what the people in the city pay using the county trash haulers. I'm pretty sure subsidies are involved. When the private trash haulers go to the landfill, they pay a fee to dump the trash. The county gets this fee. That's a subsidy, right?

But there's still the compliance problem. I'm not sure how the $3 tax will fix that unless it will be used to pay the EPA to look the other way. According to one of the private haulers, one way for the district to come into compliance is to add a handful of drop locations for recyclables in each county. Evidently there isn't enough participation and that's suppose to encourage it. In the same article from The Athens News:

He (the private hauler) said that officials often say that they are in the trash business because recycling doesn't pay for itself and they need the funds to pay for recycling.

Which is backed up on collegegreenmag.com:

“There’s not big money in recycling… so the government does it,” said Roger Bail, operations coordinator for the Athens-Hocking Waste District. “There’s money in trash.”

So they're trying to get more people to recycle more. We used to recycle stuff all the time. Pop and milk came in glass bottles. We took empty bottles to the store and got a deposit back. Now they come in throw away plastic. I like glass. And we drank water that came from the tap. You would fill a glass with water and wash the glass afterward to reuse it. Now we insist on carrying around plastic water bottles that end up in the landfill. But I'm sure the government had a hand in the glass bottles going away - probably some concern about hygiene. So the answer to that is now creating problems. Maybe if the government would stop trying to regulate everything, thus tying our hands, we wouldn't have either problem. We wouldn't be producing as much trash and would be recycling. Our trash haulers could make a living without raising rates to the point that many lower income families do not purchase the service to have their trash hauled away creating a bigger illegal dumping problem that the county also complains about.

Where and when will the madness stop?

The First Casualty

The first one to go is a deputy. He's not exactly gone. Just demoted from deputy to transport officer. He can still arrest people. He just can't answer the phone.

On July 19th, when Mark Sullivan's wife called the sheriff's office to complain about her husband's abuse, she included this part about his having marijuana. The officer she was speaking to, Randy Secoy, told her “...to put it all in a grocery bag and bring it to the sheriff's office.” When she asked about the ones still growing, he told her to “just grab a hold of them or call the office and have somebody come out.

Isn't that what she was doing? Calling the sheriff to report a crime and this is how they handle it? A crime of this nature involving any other person, would be classified a major event from the Big, Bad, Drug Task force, aka Athens County Sheriff's Department. Had this been anyone else calling, it would have been plastered all over the sheriff's facebook page touting about how big of a bust they made and we have them behind bars and you're safe from the boogeyman now.

But that's not what happened. An Athens County Commissioner, Mark Sullivan, was the one who was being accused of committing a crime. His wife was reporting it and it didn't warrant even a house call by the deputy. Maybe he was busy updating his facebook page. Or maybe it was because the involved parties included an Athens County Commissioner and his wife. What she got in response was the proverbial take two aspirin and call me in the morning. In other words, - I really don't want to deal with this. Could you call back when someone else is on duty so they can deal with it?

It took three weeks for this particular incident to make it to the public and that's only because someone called the local media anonymously. The Athens Messenger got the run-around when they requested the reports and then what they did get was redacted. A request was made to the state attorney general's office for a special prosecutor but not until after The Messenger made it a headline.

Now a couple of more weeks have passed and the first casualty has been named. Why it has taken Sheriff Kelly so long to conduct an internal investigation and take action is beyond me. I can't imagine it would have taken me much longer than the amount of time it took for me to listen to the taped call WHILE Deputy Secoy was sitting in front of me the next morning. It's not like the sheriff didn't have access to the 911 tapes. Listening to the recorded call should have been enough to at least put Deputy Secoy on leave if not outright fired. Maybe I'm just impatient and the wheels of justice turn to slow for my taste.

So now Deputy, ahem, Transport Officer Secoy has been demoted and there's this last chance agreement. Last chance for what? He'll be on probation until next August and if he does something stupid, he could be fired. What could you possibly do transporting prisoners? Oh, I suppose you could possibly taser one unnecessarily or do we only threaten 10-year old students with that? Yes. Yes we do. But that incident got him 3 days suspension and some class time in conflict resolution and a class on how to balance his personal and professional life, as reported in The Athens Messenger. Now I'm wondering if they have those classes in conjunction with the Domestic Violence Intervention Program that Mark Sullivan was supposed to attend. Is there a pattern starting to develop?

Sheriff Kelly as quoted in The Messenger:

“Randy Secoy is a good person. Randy Secoy has made mistakes and we've corrected those. We've sent Randy to training and counseling. If that proper training doesn't work, then I have to move forward and that's what we've done with Secoy.”

Okay. But Sheriff. You said that the last reprimand had no bearing on your decision to demote Secoy over this incident. If that's true, then those classes can't be included as 'time served'.

But I'm thinking there may be a bit more to this story that has yet to be revealed.

How much is the sheriff trying to cover his own butt now because he didn't deal with all this the next morning? You know Mark was all the talk around the water cooler for at least the next two or three shifts.

Who was the supervisor on duty that night if it wasn't Secoy? And if it was Secoy, why didn't he cover his own rear and handle the call like they would any other one? They get plenty of practice around here handling drug calls. It should have been relatively standard.

Why would responding to a complaint by the wife of an elected county official be any different than anyone else? I can think of a few reasons.

So, Secoy is demoted and on probation and Sullivan is still a county commissioner.

And one more question, for now:

If someone breaks into my house and I shoot them dead and call the sheriff's department to report the break-in, do you suppose they'll tell me to put 'em in a bag and bring 'em in?

What Pot? Oh, That's Just Basil

Some days I can do nothing more than shake my head at the happenings in the Athens County Commissioners Office. Well, not there exactly but at one commissioner in particular. Two days after a guilty plea for a reduced charge from a domestic violence incident, Mark Sullivan's wife called the sheriff's office again. She requested and received a protection order.

But it's what wasn't reported on that becomes interesting. When Marks' wife called that day, she also told them there were marijuana plants and seeds at the residence. No arrests were made at that time despite finding 39 plants.

Why? Had that been anyone else, the sheriff's department would have made a 'Big Bust' and it would have been plastered all over facebook like this:

Sheriff Pat Kelly
Glenn Fraley II Bowman Rd, Coolville was arrested last night after the NET executed a search warrant on his residence and seized a grow operation. Bowman was taken to SEORJ for possession with juvenile present.
July 27 at 10:43am

Not only did that not happen but nothing else happened either. It was kept quiet and hush hush until someone anonymously called The Athens Messenger three weeks later.

So, The Messenger reporter made a public records request and whatdoyaknow, they got a bit of the good ole boy run around. First, they contacted the sheriff's office. But Pat Kelly must think of Mark as a better friend than Keller Blackburn because he sent them to the prosecutor's office for the records. But Keller volleyed them back to the sheriff's office. When The Messenger finally got a copy of the report, it was redacted and the narrative part was completely omitted. What's up with that? Of course the claim is being made it's an open investigation. Whatever.

But wait! The Messenger kicked it up a notch. I'm actually quite impressed with them today. Not only did they put the almost month old news on the front page above the fold with a picture and looong article, the editor, went after Mark on the editorial page asking him to step down. Yes, that's right. The historically left-leaning local media is asking for the resignation of a D. They have been inching their way to the right over the last couple of years so maybe there is hope for them yet.

Coincidentally, our ambitious prosecutor and Nelsonville native, Keller Blackburn, requested a special prosecutor be appointed by the Ohio Attorney General's Office. Wow! How timely. It only took three weeks!

So, let's review. county commissioner pleads guilty to a reduced domestic violence charge, then his wife calls the sheriff two days later to report a similar incident and adds the pot plants and seeds in there for icing. She also adds that his kids have seen him transporting the pot for really thick icing. His friends, the sheriff and prosecutor, try to sweep it under the rug and ignore it. But there's always someone looking to ruin the party and calls the media. Bummer.

Now, both the commissioner and his wife are denying everything. They both say the dope isn't Mark's. It's the neighbor's. The stuff drying up there in the attic? Oh that's just basil.

Again, I, as a taxpayer, ask that this commissioner step down. The editor of The Messenger is asking as well. Maybe some others will also ask. Mark's personal life is a mess and at the very least he needs to get it back in order. The kids are involved and they need to be protected. Is someone looking out for them? The county commissioner's webpage includes as part of their responsibility:

Protecting children. Stabilizing families. Making welfare reform work.

County Commissioners now have the lead responsibility for delivering the bulk of human service that adults and children receive from government, and doing so with limited funding from Columbus and Washington D.C. In particular, this means making welfare reform work.

Counties now must meet state-set benchmarks for moving unemployed residents into jobs. Welfare reform also means subsidizing child care and health care for recipients, even after they find jobs. All of this comes in addition to counties� ongoing responsibility for overseeing and funding alcohol, drug abuse and mental health services, enforcing child support orders, protecting abused and neglected children, and administering food stamps.

Can a person hold a position responsible for the above, be personally violating the above, and still be effective?

Athens County Commissioner has issues

Only in Athens.

Athens County Commissioner, Mark Sullivan, pleaded guilty Tuesday to a misdemeanor of disorderly conduct. For that he got 30 days in jail, suspended as long as he doesn't re-offend for two years. I'm not sure if that means he has to completely stay out of trouble or if it just refers to hitting his wife. He also gets to pay a $250 fine and 25 hours of community service. Additionally, he gets to attend the Domestic Violence Intervention Program and alcohol/drug evaluations.

I'm wondering, is he going to have time to do this and continue serving as county commissioner? There's no indication he's going to resign.

And no one is asking him to. There are no letters to the editor and no mention of any of it on one of the local radio call-in shows where callers frequently target other elected officials.

If this would have involved our first-in-many-decades Republican commissioner, I bet people would be jumping stiff-legged demanding him to vacate the office. But he didn't do anything unbecoming an elected official because that's not like him. His values and morals are solid.

On Wednesday, Mr. Sullivan was a guest on another local radio show to talk about county issues. At about the 31 minute, 10 second mark, the host gathers up enough nerve to broach the subject. He called it a "personal mishap". Mr. Sullivan claims he would have been acquitted had he taken it to trial. But he didn't because he didn't want to put his children or his wife through it. I guess it's okay to have your children know that you hit your wife but it's not okay for them to see you defend yourself.

"Stuff happens" according to the host. He then goes on to commend him for taking steps to keep other stuff from happening I guess.

Mr. Sullivan said he would have gone to trial had they not reduced the charges and claims he only drinks 2-4 beers a month at most.

Then the host excuses the behavior by acknowledging that Mr. Sullivan had experienced some hardship.

Three minutes, 40 seconds later, Mr. Sullivan is off the hook.

And this isn't the first time Mr. Sullivan has had a run-in with the law. Back in September 2010, he was arrested in Nelsonville and in October, pleaded guilty to two counts of disorderly conduct. WSAZ covered that story as did The Columbus Dispatch.

And, the same now as then, the behavior was excused because "Mark's had a lot to deal with in his life, with the loss of his wife and his father and being a single father," Eliason said.

So, as long as he only commits crimes that are misdemeanors. Or if he does commit a more serious crime, make sure the charges are reduced to misdemeanors, he's good. As long as we are willing to excuse the behavior, it will likely continue.

He's been a county commissioner since 1998 and will in all likelihood, run again in 2012 when his current term is up. The chances he will be re-elected in this darkest blue county is pretty good. I, however, would prefer to have a county commissioner who has higher standards and lacks a criminal record that includes personal fouls.