After slashing funding for recycling efforts in the Powell area last year, Park County commissioners are being asked to restore some of those dollars.

Earlier this month, leaders of Powell Valley Recycling asked commissioners for $8,847 — the same amount provided in 2019 — instead of the $2,500 the county contributed last year.

Powell Valley Recycling Vice Chairman Myron Heny said the organization is “struggling a little bit.”

“Every year we are always short a little bit of money,” Heny told commissioners April 6, “and 2020 was a tough year for us all the way around.”

For one thing, fewer commodities were brought to the organization’s Powell center amid the pandemic. The center wound up being closed from mid-March to mid-May as part of precautions aimed at limiting the spread of COVID-19 — and it had to close for a week in December when six of the seven staffers were infected with the disease. Then there have been increased costs for things like shipping and baling wire.

“Everything is just really, really hurting us right now,” Heny said.

Powell Valley Recycling did receive two Payroll Protection Program loans — one in April 2020 and another in February — totalling $28,170. For an organization with an annual budget of less than $97,000, that support from the federal program “kept us alive,” said Heny.

Commissioners won’t finalize their 2021-22 budget until July, and they gave no indication of what funding they might provide to Powell Valley Recycling. However, Commission Chairman Lee Livingston warned that the county’s support of outside organizations is under scrutiny, particularly after voters rejected a proposed 1% sales tax for local governments.

“When the fifth penny failed, I asked people to come forward and figure out what they don’t want to fund,” Livingston said. “So I’ve been getting some pushback on some of the special requests.”

In asking commissioners to restore the $6,350 they cut from the nonprofit in 2020, Heny noted the large number of rural Park County residents who use the center.

About 42% of the facility’s monthly patrons live in rural Park County, but the county provides only about 5% of the nonprofit’s revenue; meanwhile, about 55% of the patrons are city residents, and they provide about 51% of the funding, through a $2 surcharge on their monthly utility bills.

“I guess we’re just making an appeal with that in mind,” Heny said.

The recycling center asked people to consider making a donation, but outside of a few checks, that effort wasn’t particularly successful.

“We don’t refuse anybody,” Heny added. “We don’t say, ‘Oh, you’re from the county, you’re going to have to pay us something,’ because I’m sure they’d walk away.”

He also said the organization “certainly can’t” ask for more money from City of Powell residents, saying city officials have heard some complaints about the current $2 surcharge. Powell City Council members raised concerns last year when the recycling center cut back hours and eliminated the drop-off bins that used to be stationed outside the Road 10 facility 24 hours a day.

Commissioner Scott Mangold, a former city councilman, asked whether Powell Valley Recycling leaders are looking at setting regular hours, “instead of just Tuesday-Thursday, sometimes you’re open, sometimes you’re not.”

“I know for people who like to recycle, when they show up there and they notice you guys are closed, they’ll just throw it in the nearest dumpster,” Mangold said.

The center is currently open from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays, along with the first and third Saturdays of the month from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. Heny expressed reluctance to changing those hours, saying he would hate to expand the schedule, then cut back if the commodities market crashed.

As for the bins, Powell Valley Recycling leaders have described consistent problems with trash. 

“We’ve tried everything. People just don’t cooperate,” Heny said. He recalled recently arriving at the center to find two sacks of materials lying right beneath a sign that warns not to leave items.

The center shipped out 610,700 pounds of recyclables last year, though most of that material — 340,000 pounds — was cardboard collected and stockpiled back in 2019. Heny did say that the volume of materials received at the center is starting to pick up again. Further, with the price of oil rising and plastics being recycled, Powell Valley Recycling is again accepting No. 2 plastics with screw-on lids.

“We’ll take it as long as we can,” Heny said.