By Joshua Schuetz
After nearly a decade of planning, Dodge County is finally moving forward with a reuse center that will help reduce waste and give community members access to affordable building materials and household goods. The project got to the finish line thanks to the work of CEDA team member Laura Qualey and Dodge County waste management administrator Rita Cole.
“In Dodge County, I work with the environmental services department, and I’ve worked with them for two and a half years,” said Qualey. “This has been a pet project of Rita Cole, the waste management administrator. She’s always had this dream of having one of these reuse centers where people could drop off home goods and building materials, extra two-by-fours or tile, and things like that, to reduce the amount of solid waste going into the landfills at the transfer station.”
The county had secured a Greater Minnesota Recycling and Composting grant in 2022 for $123,000 to get the project off the ground. But when the city of Kasson decided not to build a road to the proposed site, the county had to divert funds toward building the road, leaving less money for necessary infrastructure like HVAC, making it impossible to operate the building in winter.
The breakthrough came when Qualey helped secure a $200,000 grant to push the project forward. “It will allow them to upgrade the insulation and plumbing for the bathroom and get some cameras because they can’t have the center open in the wintertime without these improvements.” The grant also includes funding to hire a staff member for one year, with the hope that the center will generate enough revenue to become self-sustaining. As of October 14, the center has diverted 2,157 items, weighing a total of 32,555 pounds, from the landfill.
“They weigh everything that’s dropped off to keep track of how much is kept out of the landfill,” said Qualey. “They can convert that into statistics on the energy saved by not having to convert it to waste.”
The center will operate with designated drop-off and sale days, offering a wide variety of items, from building materials to athletic equipment, though electronics will not be accepted. “This is a great alternative to throwing these items in landfills,” Qualey said. “We’ve all been to thrift shops or rummage sales, and this offers the community something similar, while reducing waste at the same time.”