GREEN RIVER — The topic of mattress disposal was the standout issue during a Wyoming Waste Systems update at the Green River City Council meeting this week.

Michelle Foote, the site manager for WWS, said that at the beginning of October, mattresses are no longer being accepted at the landfill, and therefore cannot be disposed of in trash bins or at the transfer station. Instead, residents must haul mattresses themselves to Sweetwater County Solid Waste District No. 1, located on County Road 64: I-80 Exit 99, then 2 1\2 Miles South on Highway 191.

This is due to the solid waste district doing mattress recycling, in which they are calling a recycler in Denver to come pick up stacks of mattresses. Foote also noted that recycling doesn’t mean that the solid waste district is getting any rebates. She said the solid waste district is paying per mattress for the recycler to transport them.

“We are asking all customers that have mattresses to transport them themselves to the Sweetwater County Solid Waste District No. 1,” Foote said.

Foote said Wyoming Waste sent out notifications to apartment buildings in the city to not put mattresses in their big trash containers. However, Council Member Sherry Bushman pointed out that these notices let the building owners know how to not dispose of mattresses, but did not provide solutions of how to dispose of them. She said some people cannot transport mattresses, or do not have the means to do so.

Bushman recommended Wyoming Waste find some businesses who can transport the mattresses for residents and to supply residents with information on how to get in contact with those businesses.

“I’ve been receiving complaints from the apartments that own those properties saying, ‘I don’t know who to go to,’ and it would have been really nice to have a list of people they could have called,” Bushman said.

Council Member Ron Williams said Green River residents are now getting charged $35 to dispose of mattresses, on top of what they already pay for waste services, but Rock Springs residents don’t have to pay extra because they are within Solid Waste District No. 1.

“Is this not a change in the contract we have with you guys, that before we could dump this up there? Now, this looks to me like there’s a change in the contract now, saying, ‘sorry GR residents, we no longer do this’,” Williams said.

Williams said his issues with this change are revolving around safety, as people will be hauling mattresses on I-80, and littering.

“You’re going to get a lot of people saying, ‘I’m not paying 35 bucks, I’m going to take it up on South Hill and throw it in the sagebrush.’ Why can’t we work with Waste Management, stack up the mattresses … and then you guys take them for the city of Green River?” Williams said.

He said the number of mattresses disposed of in a month can’t be very high, and he believes Wyoming Waste should be taking them over to the solid waste district for the residents with no additional charge to residents.

“This ain’t right charging our citizens $35 for that,” he said.

However, Foote said this was not a change in Wyoming Waste’s contract, but is instead a change at the Sweetwater County landfill.

“If we took them, we would have to charge (residents) the $35,” Foote said.

She also said she did some research into having the recycler from Denver pick up mattresses at the transfer station when they pickup mattresses collected by the solid waste district, but she said the transfer station does not have the room as they estimate around the recycler will get around 105 mattresses. Additionally, she said the mattresses have to be dry and cannot be weathered.

“This was a change in the Sweetwater County landfill that we did not honestly have a voice in, this was given to us the second week of September and we had to figure it out from there,” Foote said.

Mayor Pete Rust agrees the city is going to see an issue of people dumping mattresses on the outskirts of town, and while that’s not justified, it is going to happen. He said the city needs to discuss this further to try to prevent people dumping mattresses, however, he emphasized that Wyoming Waste is not doing this to the city’s residents.

Stats and Rate Increases

Foote said Wyoming Waste has transported 137.17 tons of the curbside recycling for the year to date, which they take to Utah. This equates 274,340 pounds of recycled materials.

As for the transfer station, 2,271 residents have used the transfer station this year, which is up by about 78 residents from last year. Foote said 504 residents have disposed of 1,000 pounds or more, and 166 residents have disposed of 1,800 pounds at the transfer station. The average amount of waste taken to the transfer station per resident is 629 pounds, which is up three pounds over the last year, she said.

Foote also said that the solid waste district started recycling lithium batteries as of Oct. 1. Wyoming Waste is asking residents to keep these out of their trash bins, as they are highly flammable, and to instead take them to the transfer station where they have a 10-gallon bucket they will haul to solid waste at no additional charge.

Lastly, Foote discussed the upcoming rates increase. As per the city’s contract, Wyoming Waste can apply the Consumer Price Index (CPI) annual price increases to the waste rates. The CPI currently has a 2.4% increase, which will be reflected on all residential and commercial billing, effective Jan. 1, 2025.

Foote said they will also apply this increase to the tonnage rate at the transfer station, bringing the rate from $94.02 to $96.26.