Once the leading southwest Ohio tire recycler, Rutherford says he sold the 11-year-old South Street business to Rumpke Co., Cincinnati, in August following a three-year ordeal with the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency (OEPA).
In March, OEPA denied D&R a 2003 license application, citing the facility with several violations and for not complying with a 2001 consent agreement.
Rutherford was fined $25,100 for the violations that included:
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Several fire lanes blocked by scrap tires or solid waste;
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Noncompliance for mosquito larvae treatment;
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Standing water existing in tire piles;
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Fire lanes not properly maintained and not free of combustible materials.
Rutherford says his site is now in “total compliance” with the OEPA.
“They wanted to paint the picture that I had all these tires filled with water and I was going to kill the area with West Nile, but that’s not the facts at all,” he says. “I always kept a clean facility.”
In June, Rutherford signed a new consent agreement. But the OEPA “didn’t meet their end of the obligation,” he says.
“They said they would send me a copy of my license if I came into compliance,” Rutherford says. “I wanted to stay in competition with the correct credentials.”
Although he was reissued his license, Rutherford says a copy of the license was never sent to his business.
“If you went to the doctor and the doctor didn’t have his license on the wall, as a client you might think about that a little bit,” he says. “The Ohio EPA never sent (a copy) to me. When my customers asked to see it I had to tell them to call the EPA to clarify that I’m legal. It’s like running around with a black eye all the time. To stay ahead of the game, the best way I could see it was to sell the collection business.”
Neither Rutherford nor officials from Rumpke would disclose the exact amount for which the business was purchased other than “several hundred thousand dollars,” according to Rutherford.
“We sold the collection service part of the business to Rumpke, not the property or equipment we have,” Rutherford said.
Rumpke is leasing portions of the property to grind the tires it collects from local tire service companies and tire companies—a service D&R had once been contracted by Rumpke to perform.
The tire chips are used to line Rumpke’s landfills and have other potential uses, according to Ken Stidham, recycling manager for Rumpke.
“We can also use (tire chips) to help facilitate tire derived fuel,” Stidham says. “Electricity generators who burn large quantities of coal can burn tires as a substitute. The have the same emissions as coal and generate equal to better recovery on the heat or energy that you can get.”
As for the business, Stidham says Rumpke has made a “seamless transition for the customers” from which it collects tires.
“Other than a different truck picking up the tires, it’s the same,” he says.
“We did not purchase any property,” he says, adding that D&R is still responsible for existing matters with the OEPA. Hamilton (Ohio) Journal News