ATHENS, Ohio — More than 100 people filled the Athens City Building’s council chambers Monday to urge the city to join a council of governments to prevent the likely closure of Athens-Hocking Recycling Centers and to discuss effects of the West Union Street construction on local businesses.
Waste services
At Monday’s council meeting, AHRC Board President Andy Voigt said AHRC’s “economic future is not great at all.” Voigt also informed city council if the COG can gain enough participation from municipalities — including Athens — AHRC can hopefully resume services in Athens around August.
“In order for [AHRC] to survive, based on the amount of infrastructure we have and the amount of infrastructure we support, we do need the city of Athens to be a part of our program,” said Voigt.
Two AHRC employees also spoke. Organics processor Benjamin Shonk said his full-time job with AHRC was cut to part time a few months ago, because of the center’s financial need.
Shonk described the significance of AHRC to the job market of the Athens community, saying it is one of the “well-paying jobs in Athens.”
“I really saw a future in Athens for my family as well as other families around, and I think that without the Athens-Hocking Recycling Center, the future is bleak,” he said. “We need more support for the Athens-Hocking Recycling Center. I think that we need to keep these jobs in our town.”
Shonk also described AHRC’s role in actively educating the public for free and the center’s potential to educate children about sustainability.
“I want to be working side by side with passionate individuals that want to save the environment,” said Shonk. “Rumpke isn’t going to do that for us.”
Employee Patrick Modzelewski said, “I was here four years ago for this, when we did the bidding and everybody. I have many guys that were here with me that still work there that we were scared to death.”
Losing Athens’ business wouldn’t hurt Rumpke the way it has devastated AHRC, Modzelewski said.
“I think Rumpke was fine before they came here and I think they’d be fine without Athens, if you put AHRC out of business,” Modzelewski said. “I’m here to fight for my job and fight for my coworkers’ jobs … I just want to let everybody know that every single recycling is getting touched with these hands and multiple other hands. It’s going where it needs to go.”
Among the members of the public who spoke was Nancy Pierce of Athens Rethink Plastics, who voiced her concerns about Rumpke’s use of chemical recycling and the devastating effects that chemical recycling has on the environment and public health.
Standard recycling processes grind plastics into small pieces that can be remade into new items. Chemical recycling uses heat or chemicals to reduce plastics to their primary components.
According to an October 2023 study conducted by Beyond Plastics and the International Pollutants Elimination Network, chemical recycling “threatens the environment, the climate, human health, and environmental justice.”
Shannon Pratt-Harrington, chief sustainability officer at Zero Waste Event Productions said her organization can provide composting services to event organizers because it can use AHRC’s compost facility. She noted that other businesses in Athens such as Donkey Coffee also rely on AHRC to compost waste.
Without AHRC, she said, local businesses and organizations will have two options for compost: Ohio University’s composting facility, which she described as not a “viable option for [Zero Waste Event Production’s] or the city’s compost,” and the Southeastern Correctional Institute in Lancaster, which is not nearly an hour away but also a prison so “the labor for the compost there is questionable.”
Sean White, co-owner of Little Fish Brewing Company, spoke about his business’s personal experience as a customer of AHRC, saying that AHRC quickly and personally attends to local businesses when an issue with waste management arises. White said large companies like Rumpke tend to take much longer to resolve such issues.
Athens resident Barbara Campagnola said AHRC is important to the Athens community as a local institution.
“I urge the council to take up the council of governments so we can align with the values of so many of our community members,” said Campagnola, “I don’t live here because of corporate America, I live here because we’re local.”
Many attendees said they would not mind a price increase for waste services if it meant keeping AHRC.
Union Street construction
Many Athens business owners also spoke at the meeting to voice their concerns with the city’s construction project on West Union Street.
Avalanche Pizza owner John Gutekanst said the construction has caused him to lose half of his daily clientele at the company’s Slice House, at 540 West Union, which has led him to cut hours for his employees.
“That road is is empty half the time, the whole road,” Gutekanst said. “We’re staring at a desert, literally, because they can’t make it two ways, or do whatever they have to do.”
Athens Real Estate Company Owner Ally Rapp Lee described the street’s state as “a mess,” with little progress happening at each stage of its construction.
Rapp Lee said it’s difficult for drivers to determine where business entrances are, inhibiting clientele for Athens Real Estate Company and surrounding businesses. Although the city has placed signs indicating where to enter a business’ parking area, Rapp Lee said that she and other business owners often see drivers drive through the closed off sections of the road, inhibiting the flow of the one-lane traffic.
“We are asking to make West Union street two lanes again to minimize the disruption to businesses,” said Rapp Lee.
Before the public comment period, Mayor Steve Patterson addressed the state of West Union and what the city is doing in response to public concerns.
“We are pushing the contractor to finish all the work on Herrold Drive as fast as possible so [West Union] returns to bi-directional travel,” Patterson said. “We are asking the contractor Shelly & Sands to provide a change order cost for us to complete phase four early on the western half of the project. That is from the West Union bridge to the fairgrounds, so that two-way traffic can be reintroduced on that section by August.”
Patterson said the company has not yet provided a “firm price,” but “there are early indications that when they do, the city will definitely have to pay handsomely to have that change order come through.”
Patterson also acknowledged a shortfall in communications as required by the contract.
“We do not believe that the contractor has met this requirement as robustly as they could, so we’re pushing them to make the liaison more available to property owners — particularly when they have specific events or other needs,” Patterson said.
Athens City Council’s next regular meeting will be at 7 p.m. Monday, April 15, in Athens City Hall, Council Chambers, third floor, 8 E. Washington St. Meetings are also available online. Regular sessions are on the first and third Mondays of the month; committee meetings are on the second and fourth Mondays.
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