Beginning March 1st the Blue Mountain recycling and waste transfer station will be temporarily closed for approximately six weeks and all glass recycling is being discontinued.  The City of Port Angeles says supply chain issues have delayed delivery of necessary equipment to operate the facility requiring the closure. Port Angeles is taking over collection of recycling and yard waste from Waste Connections, Inc.  An announcement from the city says commercial cardboard bins are also slightly delayed, but overly large service disruptions are not anticipated. After investigating the glass recycling market, the City discovered there is only one recycling facility in the entire state of Washington, and they are no longer accepting glass at this time. The city says it will continue to monitor potential glass recycling market changes over the coming months in hopes that an option to utilize a reuse stream becomes available. Until then, glass is to be disposed of through regular solid waste means.

Efforts to make schools safer in earthquake and tsunami prone areas  took a big step forward Wednesday. State senators voted unanimously to support a bill that would authorize up to $500 million dollars in bonds to finance a school safety grant program to retrofit buildings in danger. During Wednesday’s floor debate Democratic State Senator David Frockt of Seattle said school seismic safety could range anywhere from a brace for a building to relocating a building entirely.

FROCKT:  “This is not a theoretical problem Madam President. You may remember there was a volcanic eruption in Tonga I believe about a week ago and we had tsunami warnings on the coast and nothing really happened. But what would happen if there had been a more serious one.  I would note the bill provides for evacuation tsunami towers as an option as well, so these elevated platforms could be built under this legislation.”

Republican Senator Mark Schoesler from the eastern Washington community of Ritzville was a co-sponsor of the bill.

“Some of us have tragic fires. Some of us have floods. Some are in a position that it’s not a matter of if there is an earthquake disaster but when, or a tsunami. I think what we have here is a very much needed improvement to how we do this. It is a statewide issue that requires a statewide solution.”

The grant program would pay two-thirds of the cost of replacing or retrofitting eligible schools in earthquake or tsunami prone areas. The measure now heads to the House for consideration.

Peninsula Health Officer Dr. Allison Berry says she and superintendents of the Peninsula’s public school districts were caught off guard yesterday when State Superintendent Chris Reykdal said he will be recommending to Governor Inslee that the statewide mask mandate for students be dropped and the decision for masking options be returned to local public health officials. 

She told the Peninsula Daily News that “A lot of us didn’t see that coming.”  She says local health jurisdictions do not agree with him.

Health officers in the state are in agreement – now is not the time to lift masking mandates in schools. She says health officials will be meeting soon to discuss the metrics for when that mandate can and should be lifted.  She noted that the largest number of positive COVID cases during the past week on the Peninsula were children 10 to 17 years of age.