The Times Record reported on Oct. 6 that the Brunswick Town Council unanimously voted to adjust the hours of operation and the brush or wood waste disposal fees at the Graham Road Processing Facility as of Nov. 5. 

Other fees will evidently remain the same, and there is a list of them on the town’s website. 

Since the landfill closed in April, the site has been designated a processing facility where certain types of trash and recyclables can be left for disposal. That primarily includes non-hazardous materials and those that are not accepted in curbside recycling bins. Metals, tires, electronics, white goods (large appliances), wood waste, universal waste, leaves, and brush can all be left there. Some, including brush, have an associated fee in addition to the residential disposal sticker needed to get into the facility in the first place. 

The stickers still cost $5 a year, but residential waste wood and brush fees have been reduced from $10 per cubic yard to $5, and the minimum fee reduced to $2.50.  The hours of operation will now also be reduced to only Saturday between 8:00 a.m. and 3:30 p.m.  According to the town manager, the facility sees little use. That would be especially so most days during the week. 

Note that it is a violation of town ordinances to leave brush at the leaf drop on Industry Road. That drop-off point is specifically for leaves and yard waste. The term “yard waste” is, of course, a little vague. My experience says it reasonably includes stalky plants, like tomato plants, lilies, or irises that are cut down for the winter, but any stick larger than a pencil, I would consider brush. Those should go to the processing facility on a Saturday.  

As a guide, brush usually needs to be ground up in order to compost or be otherwise used in a reasonable amount of time. The cost to do that is apparently why there are fees associated with it. According to the director of Public Works, the material collected at Industry Road is not processed in any way by the town. It is just collected and delivered to one or another of a few places where it is composted. That means it has to be small enough to compost easily, or it is not worthwhile for anyone to do it, and the stuff would all have to be taken to Graham Road for a fee. 

A small pickup truck bed, if you measure it all out, will usually hold about one-and-a-half yards of material, tightly packed like sand. A full-sized pickup truck is more like two yards. Either way, the smaller you make your pieces of brush, the smaller the load and the fee. A cubic yard is 27 cubic feet — a space three feet wide, by three feet deep, by three feet long, or any combination that multiplies out to 27. 

The Recycle Bin is a weekly column on what to recycle, what not to recycle, and why, in Brunswick. The public is encouraged to submit questions by email to brunsrecycleinfo@gmail.com. Harry Hopcroft is a member of the Brunswick Recycling and Sustainability Committee, though his opinions are his own and do not necessarily reflect those of the committee.