Novastus Owner Kelly Warbis said he is disappointed in the Putnam County Commission’s decision on Monday to deny the company’s request to expand its facility and capacity.
Putnam’s decision comes after several citizens made complaints regarding loose trash and the smell coming from the current facility. Warbis said he believes residents and a majority of the commissioners did not put in enough effort to understand the expansion.
“You know, two out of the entire commisisoners actually took the time to come over here and see what it is we do and take a look at the facility,” Warbis said. “So I am not surprised in what happened.”
Warbis said he is not sure if people having garbage near them was the main factor, but believes it contributed to the decision. Warbis said the complaints from residents about trash and smell were surprising to him.
“People will say anything when they don’t want progress to come in,” Warbis said. “You know, I guess let the record answer for itself, if there were any complaints, you know, why haven’t they called the city and registered, you know, those complaints. I mean, I have called and sent in complaints on the street lights numerous times, so little stuff in town, I will complain about. So if odor issues or garbage were going on somebody’s property, I mean, I would have complained.”
Since the expansion was denied, Warbis said Novastus will consider multiple options on how to move forward. One of those options includes relocating out of Putnam County.
“If you are not wanted somewhere, maybe you just leave, but I’ve got a lot of, well, I had a lot of employees, and we decided to lay off our employees after the meeting came,” Warbis said. “So most of those people didn’t want to move, don’t want to move, so we will take a look at it and figure out where we are and what we are gonna do moving forward.”
Warbis said several other communities want Novastus to establish itself in their community. Warbis said the facility already has Jackson Law at the facility, which opens the door for other options without relocating.
“We can receive all the garbage at this facility, put a shredder in here, and then convey the material over to the building next door,” Warbis said. “And that doesn’t require Jackson Law permitting at that point. The unfortunate thing about that is that the garbage would be coming, you know, not really off of CC Camp [Road], but would be coming in front of these apartment complexes, and all of the air would be over in the new facility side, so there would probably be more chance to smell and garbage flying around if we did that over here, but that’s an option that we have to do that, is take advantage of the law and just get the permit next door for that and increase our tonage rate to be received and just use this as kind of the tipping floor and use the processing that’s next door.”
Some local officials claimed that they did not see or receive complaints regarding the bad smell and loose trash. Warbis said he finds the complaints that nearby residents have made surprising.