MERIDIAN, Idaho — Company leadership is asking the city to let them stay for at least two and a half more years while they move operations—longer than some neighbors want.
- The company says two and a half years would be the minimum time needed to move everything to the Nampa site.
- Neighbors we spoke to say they should have already been prepping to leave as new homes are being built near the facility.
- Meridian's city council has already heard several hours of public testimony at multiple meetings.
- The city is expected to make a decision at the Dec 17 council meeting.
(Below is the transcript from the broadcast story)
Some neighbors in this quiet South Meridian neighborhood are hoping the City of Meridian will not approve Timber Creek Recycling's request to secure an extension to operate.“Everybody I spoke to was not in favor of it,” said Troy Allen who lives near the facility.
As I previously reported, the facility’s current development agreement would require them to vacate the property within 30 days of a ‘certificate of occupancy,’ from nearby developing subdivisions. Which are anticipated to lay concrete come spring.
Timber Creek’s President Mike Murgoitio showed me around the facility. His family has owned the land for decades and used it for Agricultural purposes.
He and Vice President Caleb Lakey tell me the goal is to move operations to their facility in Nampa on Northside Blvd, something they say would take at least two and a half years, which is why they are asking the council for security to stay through surrounding development.
“We compost in a different way out there, what’s called an ‘aerated static pile’ pad. So that pad allowed us to compost in about half the time, in a much more controlled environment,” said Lakey. Besides noise from the trucks dropping off material and dust from previous operations of grinding concrete and asphalt, the smell of the compost including ‘Waste Activated Sludge’ or ‘WAS’ from cheese whey creates an unpleasant environment for neighboring families.
“There’s no positives about it. It’s very, almost sickening like you don’t want to be outside. I don’t believe that the 'WAS,' as it’s called, is even an allowed product, to go in there,” said Allen.
Timber Creek says they have tried to be good neighbors and mitigate distributive operations. They even had a neighbor who previously opposed them, back them up during the last council meeting.
“When you hear the term industrial waste it sounds really awful, and when you really get into the Ag side of it, about what it actually is [that] we’re composting, he understood that it was safe product and we’re doing great things, where it [waste] would have been going in the landfill,” said Murgoitio.
Murgoitio says he is confident that he and the city can find a compromise come the December City Council meeting, ‘We are working really closely with our regulators, DEQ, and the health department, so that’s important for the City Council to know and for us to be moving forward with them.”
