PORT ORCHARD – Two North Kitsap businesses were among the recipients of the annual Earth Day Awards, presented April 13 at the Board of County Commissioners meeting in Port Orchard.
Waste Wise @ Work Business of the Year: Watson (Poulsbo)
The Waste Wise @ Work program is a voluntary technical assistance and recognition program for businesses with outstanding waste reduction and recycling practices. Watson components are manufactured using recycled and recyclable materials, building adjustable furniture that lasts, which prolongs its life cycle, facilitates re-use, and conserves the resources required to replace it.
Watson has an aggressive resource conservation program for its almost 300 employees, recycling 93 percent of all their materials. These include wood, steel, saw dust, bottles, fabric, cardboard, cans, paper and specialty items such as printer cartridges and batteries. Recycling stations are color coded, well labeled, and placed in convenient locations.
Watson has instituted a number of innovative, sustainable practices throughout its factory in Poulsbo. All wood procured is grown within 500 miles of the factory. Packaging options are researched and evaluated by a packaging expert and reused where possible. Any extra supplies are donated to local organizations or offered free to employees who are encouraged to submit ideas for reducing waste.
“We are builders,” Watson CEO Clif McKenzie said. “We create jobs and careers by building products that excite us – and that others are pleased to buy. We do this in a manner in which our parents and our children would be proud.”
Excellence in Waste Reduction and Recycling: Olympic Organics, Jeff West (Kingston)
Composting has significant economic and environmental benefits, such as improving soil health and structure, increasing drought resistance, and reducing the need for supplemental water, fertilizers and pesticides.
Olympic Organics is a composting and topsoil company providing high-quality organics to the community. Jeff West, co-founder and president of New Day Recycling and the newly opened Olympic Organics, re-introduced composting service in to Kitsap County as the only composting facility in the county. During the last year, the company turned this non-operational facility into a viable and valuable piece of the solid waste system.
In 2014, Olympic Organics processed 14,000 yards of organic waste ranging from yard debris from the general public, to food wastes collected from local school programs. It cleaned up approximately 6,000 cubic yards of biosolids and 7,000 yards of stumps that were left on site.
The addition of Olympic Organics will better enable New Day Recycling as well as others to provide services for the collection of organics, offering both residential and commercial composting services.
“We can’t force people to compost,” West said, “but we can provide a place for people to do so if they choose.”
