MARIES COUNTY — Operation Clean-Up Maries County was one of five projects that did not receive funding in the recent 2019 grant selections of the Ozark Rivers Solid Waste Management District (ORSWMC). At Monday’s Maries County Commission meeting, there was discussion about why the county’s request was not funded for the first time since 1999.

Presiding Commissioner Ray Schwartze previously had commented there was not enough money to fund all of the projects. About a week ago, a group met to score all of the grant requests. At the end of it, 15 projects throughout the Meramec Region received funding totaling $185,049.13. The requests for these same projects totaled $372,156.95 and this does not include the five unfunded projects that were scored below 70 percent. Schwartze said a week after the grant requests were scored, the ORSWMD board members met and a motion was made to accept the rated grant round and it was approved. Maries County requested $14,895 but it was not funded. Phelps County also was not funded for its Tough on Trash program request of $12,350.

Maries County Sheriff Chris Heitman was very upset about the county’s former trash patrol program losing its funding.   Heitman places the blame on former Belle Mayor Steve Vogt, who scored the county’s grant request very low, at 47 (31.3 percent). Vogt scored Maries County’s request lower than any other individual who scored the county’s grant request. Other scores were 130 (86.6 percent), 140 (93.3 percent) 145 (96.6 percent), 134 (89.3 percent), 113 (75.3 percent), 89 (59.3 percent), and 83 (55.3 percent).

Heitman said obviously Vogt was bias with Maries County’s score. Heitman said he is concerned about how the process was handled and thinks the fact that he and Vogt have gone through civil litigation together in small claims court and it may have played a role in Vogt’s low score of Heitman’s newly acquired program. In 2017, Vogt gave Maries County a score of 100 percent, and Heitman said the difference is that Heitman is running the program instead of Ken Ramsey. “It is rather apparent that there is a flaw in the impartial nature of the rating process,” Heitman said.

Vogt said Heitman is entitled to his opinion. Vogt said there were a lot of requests, more than they had funding for and he tried to base his ratings on the quality of the different projects. He said there were more projects than usual and he was not the only person to score the grant requests. Vogt said he has supported the county’s program in the past. He’s been part of the grant scoring for over six years, he said.

Ken Ramsey operated the trash patrol program since 1999 and always received funding for the program. A new truck was purchased for the program and when the sheriff’s office took over the program this year, the truck became part of the sheriff’s office fleet. The commissioners talked about the truck on Monday morning and what will happen to it. Schwartze said because it was purchased with a grant, they have to keep it for five years. Clerk’s Deputy Renee Kottwitz said the truck is paid for but  DNR has a lien on it. As long as they use it to keep picking up trash, it’s okay. 

Schwartze said there are some other funding sources for the Operation Clean-Up Maries County program. Jill Hollowell, MRPC Environmental Programs Manger, sent Schwartze and email saying the board was concerned about this long-time project not being funded and alternative funding sources through MRPC grants were offered for the county’s program. The sheriff will have to apply for these grants. The grants include stream clean-up activities, illegal dump clean-up and surveillance camera services, and reimbursement for electronics and appliances when they are collected from roadsides. 

Western District Commissioner Ed Fagre asked if the county will have to do away with the program. Kottwitz said the sheriff will apply again next year. Heitman said not getting the funding will severely limit the trash enforcement activities because people won’t work for free. He said he will continue to apply for grant funding and hopes to be more successful in the future.

Schwartze, who has been active in MRPC projects, said each person who is scoring the projects gets a stack of papers and they hand them in after making their scores. “You don’t see how other people vote,” he said, adding the ORSWMD hardly ever has enough money for all of the needs requested with the grants. They also are changing the focus of the grant requests, going more toward education and recycling rather than picking up trash along a county road. Kottwitz said Heitman had this in mind when he wrote the grant request as he has been to the schools to educate students about recycling, which is something Ramsey did not do. 

“This past year Operation Clean-up Maries County recovered more wastes, provided more community outreach programs, and conducted numerous education programs in our schools that was never done before.  We laid out next year’s agenda with even more activities and higher goals in this next application,” Heitman said.  “I hate that I will not be able to provide as much of a service to our community because of Vogt’s actions.”

Operation Clean-Up Maries County, along with MRPC  and the ORSWMD is sponsoring a special waste collection in Vichy on Saturday from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the Vichy Firehouse for recycling electronics, appliances and metals. There are fees for electronics, appliances and tires. This recycle event is open to all persons in the Meramec Region.

Eastern District Commissioner Doug Drewel said he thinks it’s “screwed up” that people are charged to recycle and then the items are sold for scrap. Kottwitz said that’s part of the problem with people dumping in county road ditches because they don’t want to pay to recycle. She said Heitman has to provide a fork lift for the recycle event in order to load the items on pallets. He’ll have to borrow one from somebody.