State officials are hoping to sell a tire recycling plant in southwest Baltimore County that has lost $7 million since it opened in 2003 and nearly bankrupted the Maryland Environmental Service, a self-supporting public corporation.
“It was a well thought out idea, but the execution leaves something to be desired,” said former Harford County executive James Harkins, who heads the corporation, told a Senate budget subcommittee Monday. “It is a business that we ought not to be in.”
The Maryland Environmental Service (MES) was set up to provide profit-making services related to wastewater treatment, solid waste management, recycling of waste products and environmental cleanup.
Harkins took over the agency in 2005.
“I had some serious concerns” about revenues, particularly the losses from the tire facility on Hollins Ferry Road. We believe [MES] would be bankrupt in four years” if the losses continued, Harkins said.
“We have exhausted our reserves” paying for the tire plant, MES treasurer Joe Zimmerman said.
The MES facility recycles more than 900,000 tires a year, just under 20 percent of the state total. They are turned in high quality crumb rubber and rubber mulch, which is then resold in bulk and in bags. But the product costs more per pound to make than the price it fetches.
Harkins said the plant was built with Swedish technology that is expensive to fix and replace.
Other commercial recyclers of tires said the operation is too small and tries to do too many functions on one site, said Harkins? chief of staff, John O?Neill. “We have exhausted all our other options.”
MES has hired the Clifton Gunderson consulting firm of to assess the value of the facility and the equipment for sale, probably to another recycler.
The corporation is continuing to operate the facility to maximize its sale value.
