County picks site to replace Green Owl

PRIEST RIVER — The quandary over where to develop a new waste collection site to replace the troubled Green Owl site could be over.

A citizen’s advisory board that has spent the last 11 months evaluating potential sites north of town and is recommending the county purchase property at 911 East River Road and develop the site there.

The proposed Peninsula Valley waste site would sit on five acres appraised at $75,000.

“We have met with the neighbors in close proximity of the above mentioned property and have received their approval,” the committee said in letter of recommendation.

County commissioners on Tuesday unanimously adopted recommendations to purchase the property at the appraised price after hosting a public meeting to acquaint people with what’s being proposed.

“It sounds pretty good,” commission Chairman Joe Young said of the plan and the committee work that went into it. “They’ve been doing the work in the neighborhoods and everything, and I have not heard of one person that doesn’t want to move forward with this at that site.”

The date and location of the meeting is pending.

The county seeks to sidestep the controversy that erupted when it announced plans last year to shut the Green Owl site and develop an attended collection site on county property in the 1200 block of Peninsula Road.

The county wants to close Green Owl because it is unattended and is routinely used for illegal dumping and fee dodgers.

Neighboring landowners strongly objected to the plan and the fact that no public input was solicited before making a site relocation decision. Neighbors were afraid the collection site would diminish their property values and bring unwanted public safety and environmental impacts.

The uproar led to the formation of the Green Owl Citizen’s Advisory Committee, which studied a number site alternatives and narrowed the list to two choices — the East River Road site and another parcel off Peninsula Road.

The committee was advised last week that the Peninsula Road landowner was no longer interested in selling, Solid Waste Director Leslie Marshall said.

The East River Road parcel is owned by Larry Bauska, who is a member of the relocation committee. The property is also being eyed for a new West Pend Oreille Fire District station.

Preliminary discussions involve having the station face the road and having the collection site sit behind the station.

Marshall said an Idaho Department of Environmental Quality toured both of the short-listed sites.

“They preferred the one that we’re looking at buying,” said Marshall, explaining that the East River Road site had no stormwater runoff or wetlands issues.

The proposal will go through a formal public review when the county applies for a conditional use permit to develop the site.