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Johnson County Landfill Tour 4-6-2017

Seeing is believing… and sometimes that’s just what it takes to put the mind in motion..
I began reaching out to landfills in the midwest around January of 2017.
What I found is if they are private, there are no legal motions that require allowing public to see them. 
Go to east or west coast and landfill tours may be more common. Here in the midwest however, most doors are closed.
After reaching out to a few dozen landfills across multiple states, I put the phone down, stopped emailing, and went on with my life.
Three months later I received an email from Mike Hey, the new director of communications and the Johnson county landfill. He said not only would he show me the landfill, but he would be honored.
We met, and went on a drive…
Over the mountains and through the hills to the Johnson county landfill we go.
He had just taken position in Kansas City as Waste Management had just bought out deffenbaugh.
A new guy on the floor to clean up years worth of messes.
From wars between the truck drivers and landfillers, to running the fill 24/7 over working everyone, cutting corners, which was producing a costly smell on the community around it.
As we drive up and over, the first thing we see is almostan art installation of plastic bags fluttering in the wind.. all caught by trees and fences. “ plastic bags are by far our worst enemy here. They can fly up and over for miles, leading to community complaints against us. We installed this fence dozens feet tall and a couple millions in cash for the bags alone.” 
“Running this place 24/7 was running a race that no-one was going to win. I changed the hours. I gave my guys gift cards to mc Donalds and forced them to buy eachother lunch and talk. I told them. "Your new job is becoming best friends with each trucker and filler out here." Now we got a team that shows up, works as a team, gets the job done full hearted and gets to go home feeling a days worth of work has been successfully done.” 
We go to the base of the cavity* as they call the open spot where all our “stuff” goes.
They dump our stuff. And then a series of layers are applied… dirt, plastic, gravel. And rinse and repeat.
A separate company comes to collect and sell the methane run off. 
It’s beautiful , the way the birds “vermin” flow with the bags in the wind, white dancers all around. And the smell… so think you can collect a residue on you with it.
The recycling facility is much simpler.,.,. more of a sort, collect, bale, and ship out to whoever will take it.
Mike Hey says “when we came here last year the landfills life was estimated another 40 years. With our change in management and style of business we have more than quadrupled this number. “
What I hear is “less incentive to recycle” But from where he’s coming from, Us(the community), Is so absolutely poor at effective recycling that getting us to do more of a bad job would only hurt us and the business that Mike is trying to improve on.
The more space in the landfill, the longer this current system can remain.
I see him, and I am so grateful for him and this landfill. It’s buying us time. It’s buying us time to educate ourselves and change our ways. 

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