Trash firm expands with new transfer station

Trash haulers across northwest Missouri, as well as residents of Maryville and other area towns, have a new alternative for disposing of waste and refuse.

Nodaway county's first-ever privately operated waste-handling facility known as the Highway 136 Transfer Station, opened late last month just west of Ravenwood.

Located a few yards north of the highway for which it is named, the station is owned by Dennis Porter, who also operates Porter Trash, a solid waste and recycling business serving customers in a half-dozen Missouri counties sandwiched between Interstate 29 and Interstate 35.

Porter said he built the station to handle waste collected by Porter Trash trucks, but added that the facility is set up as a separate business and designed to serve the needs of both other haulers and the public.

Since being licensed by the state Department of Natural Resources on Dec. 19, the station has been collecting about 40 tons of refuse a day. Porter said he hopes to increase that figure to between 60 and 70 tons and noted that the DNR-rated capacity is 360 tons.

The core of the station is a 60-by-70-foot metal building standing 30 feet high. One end of the concrete floor terminates with a ledge that drops off into a bay wide enough to accommodate a semitrailer. A large front-loader is used to scoop trash over the ledge into the trailer, where it is compacted before being hauled to the Hamm Sanitary Landfill in Lawrence, Kan.

Similar to the transfer station on North Main operated by the city of Maryville, the facility also includes a 40-foot-long scale capable of handling 18-wheelers.

Porter said he decided to move forward with the station both to add a layer of integration to his trash-hauling business and to stabilize costs. Prior to last month, most Porter-collected refuse ended up at the Maryville facility, and Porter said that a series of fee increases there was eating into his bottom line.

"Basically I had to do this to stay in business," he said.

The so-called "tipping" fee at Highway 136 Transfer Station is $48 a ton.

Disposal cost for loads weighing less than 500 pounds is reduced to a flat rate of $12. Porter said contracts with other haulers mean those fees are locked in for at least two years.

Maryville's facility charges $54 a ton, with loads of under 1,000 pounds accepted for a flat rate of $26.25.

Though the City Council in 2012 took a number of steps to reduce costs and increase revenue, the Maryville station had been operating at a deficit of between $80,000 and $90,000 for several years. Several council members have expressed concerns that a competing facility will significantly reduce transfer station volume and, by extension, revenue.

City Manager Greg McDanel has floated the possibility of an ordinance that would require all haulers collecting trash in Maryville to use the municipal station, but so far the council has taken no action on the proposal.

In addition to processing refuse destined for a landfill, the new Porter facility also accepts recyclable materials, including cardboard, paper, tires, appliances, tin cans and plastic containers.

Unlike trash, recyclables can be dropped off at no charge, except for tires, which carry a fee of $120 per ton. Porter Trash currently donates all of its waste cardboard, paper, tin and plastic to the NoCoMo Industries Sheltered Workshop in Maryville, which re-sells it.

Porter is hoping the transfer station will fuel growth for the business he founded in 1996. Porter Trash and the transfer station combined currently employ 17 people, with most of the collection volume coming from the area between Ravenwood and Bethany.

In Maryville, Porter competes with several other commercial haulers. But the company has exclusive contracts with eight other municipalities across its service area, which extends south from the Iowa line to Rosendale in northern Andrew County.

"You've got to keep going, keep gaining business," Porter said. "If you're not collecting someplace, somebody else is going to do it."