Black Hawk County Solid Waste Commission outlines shift from disposal to resource recovery, seeks outreach coordinator

Brian Heath, chairperson of the Black Hawk County Solid Waste Management Commission, and John Foster, the commission’s landfill administrator, told the Board of Supervisors that the commission is shifting from a narrow landfill-disposal focus to broader resource-recovery projects, and asked supervisors to consider staff and policy support for the effort.

The presentation noted the commission owns the landfill and manages waste flow for most of Black Hawk County. “We were established basically in 1974,” Foster said, describing the commission’s history. Heath said the commission is “looking at resource recovery rather than just landfill operations,” and described recent investments and planning for future work.

The commission reported it now has roughly eight years of constructed landfill airspace and about 25 years of permitted airspace that would require capital investment to build out. Foster said the commission receives about 2,000 tons of waste per year and serves five counties. He told supervisors the commission does not use general-taxpayer funding for operations, relying…