Hazardous household waste-collection sites set

Sat. October 04, 2008; Posted: 05:23 PM

After the death of a family member this summer, the Vancouver woman had a medicine cabinet full of pain medications she needed to get rid of.

She didn't want to flush them down the toilet, realizing the chemicals would ultimately end up in the Columbia River. She didn't want to throw them in the trash, understanding they may leach into groundwater below a landfill.

"I thought I would go about it the right way," she said.

As Shinn found out, safely disposing of household hazardous waste isn't a straightforward proposition for the environmentally conscious consumer. This week, during Household Hazardous Waste Awareness Week, several local collection events will help area residents safely clear away the detritus of modern life.

Shinn described her odyssey in trying to get rid of her relative's pain medication:

A firefighter told her to give it to the mortician, who told her to call a pharmacy, which instructed her to call Waste Connections, which passed her on to Central Transfer and Recycling Center.

After hitting a dead end there, she called her daughter, who suggested calling Southwest Washington Medical Center, which pointed her back to a pharmacy. Striking out again, she called the city of Vancouver's Water Resources Education Center, which sent her on to the Clark County Solid Waste Program, which instructed her to take the collection of pain meds to the Clark County Jail.

Bingo!

"The girl took them all. She said, 'Everyone knows you're supposed to bring them here,'aEUR%" Shinn said. "I said, 'Really?'aEUR%"

Clearly, not everyone knows.

County officials are hoping to minimize the amount of toxic materials tainting groundwater and the Columbia River, said Jim Mansfield, a waste reduction specialist for Clark County. The alternative is incineration in a controlled environment.

"The more toxic material you can keep out of the landfill, the better," Mansfield said.

Food chain worries

He said that a half-teaspoon of mercury can contaminate an average lake for several hundred years. Fish or other wildlife can then ingest mercury and pass it up the food chain to humans. Once mercury enters the food chain, he said, it is nearly impossible to remove.

Over the next week, Southwest Washington residents will have a chance to safely and cheaply dispose of a variety of environmentally sensitive materials:

-- Tuesday, 9 a.m. to noon: Legacy Salmon Creek Hospital, 2211 N.E. 139th St. (Use the Northeast 23rd Avenue entrance.) Mercury thermometers, unwanted medication, hearing aids, cell phones and eyeglasses will be collected. The first 50 participants will receive a free non-mercury thermometer in exchange for mercury thermometers.

-- Wednesday, 1 to 4 p.m., Southwest Washington Medical Center, 400 N.E. Mother Joseph Place. The collection site is at the entrance to the Education Center just south of the 92nd Avenue hospital entrance. Mercury thermometers, unwanted medications, hearing aids, cell phones and eyeglasses will be collected. The first 50 participants will receive a free non-mercury thermometer in exchange for mercury thermometers.

-- Friday, 9 a.m. to 1 p.m., Clark College, Purple 1 parking lot by the soccer field at 1900 Fort Vancouver Way. Computers and other electronics and block foam.

-- Saturday, 9 a.m. to 1 p.m., Clark County Public Works Operations Center, 4700 N.E. 78th St. Computers and other electronics, block foam and household hazardous waste.

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