ABOVE: The yard waste recycling site in Fairmont on Monday afternoon as burning is being done. Burning of materials, in eight piles, as seen in the bottom left corner, started last week and is being done to clear excess material.

FAIRMONT– The yard waste recycling site in Fairmont is currently being burned in an attempt to get rid of excess material. Burning started on Feb. 10 and is expected to continue through this week.

Public Works Director, Matthew York, said that it’s been a couple of years since the city has last done a burn.

“It’s a way to take a lot of material and dispose of it quickly and cost-effectively,” said York.

Most recently, the city has been tub grinding the material through a contractor, Shamrock, that then recycles or sells the material.

“We get a discounted rate on tub grinding because he’s selling it,” York explained.

The burn will specifically help to get rid of a lot of the logs and larger piles at the site to help the city redevelop the area going into the 2025 season.

There’s a lot of excess due to Emerald Ash Borer as the city alone has removed over 2,000 Ash trees in the past few years. The site is open to Fairmont taxpayers and private contractors also pay to use the space.

The burning is being done by BLAC Construction and the Fairmont City Council approved up to $65,000 for burning. Right now York said it’s looking like it will come in around $58,000.

“We don’t have the expertise on staff or the physical equipment to do burns ourselves right now,” York said. “We want to make sure we’re hiring people to reduce injuries to our people and our equipment.”

When they started the burn there was over 45,000 cubic yards of material that was split into eight piles.

“We burned for three days and we burned about a pile a day,” York said.

Due to western winds, burning was not done on Thursday or Friday last week.

“The goal is by the end of (this) week, weather dependent, we’ll complete the burning process,” York said.

The road is closed to through traffic while the burn is taking place due to visibility issues and people are also asked to stay away for safety reasons.

The city council is expected to talk about the future of the yard waste recycling site at an upcoming work session.