About 100 Marion County residents were in the audience, including the mayors of Salem, Woodburn and Silverton, three Salem City Council members, Randy Franke of the Board of Commissioners, and fifteen members of the Advisory Council. CCTV cameramen recorded the three hour session. Paul Connett, Ph.D, professor of chemistry and internationally known expert on waste incineration, pointed out that the goal of incinerating medical waste is to destroy the pathogens which live on it. He explained that hospital administrators must decide how to deal with the medical waste generated by their respective hospital. Richard Gates neglected to mention that having the option to transport medical waste for incineration remotely allows these hospital administrators to shirk their responsibility.
Money solves any problem.
They just pay to 'ship their trouble' someplace else. Unfortunately for the people of Oregon's north Willamette Valley, the 'someplace else' is Brooks, on the Interstate 5 corridor between Salem and Portland. New information for many in the audience was revealed when Connett listed three safe and acceptable alternatives to incineration which are less costly and can be accomplished on hospital grounds. No risk is acceptable if it is avoidable. As a matter of fact, Stack One that contained the medical waste measured even lower than Stack Two with just municipal solid waste.