Scrap tires will be collected at the East Mountain Transfer Station at Tijeras on Oct. 17 and 18; and at the Estancia Valley Solid Waste Authority Collection Stations at Moriarty, Estancia and Mountainair on Oct. 30 and 31 and Nov. 1.

During those dates, residential customers can bring in their used tires free of charge to be recycled, according to EVSWA Manager Joseph Ellis.

Commercial scrap tire generators must still make their own arrangements for disposal, he said.

The tires will be taken to the Torrance County Regional Landfill, where they will be processed and shipped to State Rubber and Environmental Solutions, a recycling facility in Denver City, Texas. There the tires will be shredded into 6-inch chunks, then returned to the Torrance County landfill to be used as alternative daily cover over the garbage.

Next spring, EVSWA and the municipalities of Moriarty, Estancia, Mountainair and Edgewood will conduct spring cleanups, with another scrap tire roundup. Once again, the tires will be processed and shipped for recycling, with the end product being beneficially used in New Mexico, Ellis said.

The work is being done with a $153,000 grant from the New Mexico Environment Department.

The solid waste authority has been cleaning up tire abatements for the past several months, Ellis said, including about 9,000 tires at one McIntosh site alone. He estimated 200 tons of scrap tire have been cleaned up and recycled in the area since the work began. He expects the coming projects to generate 300 tons of additional scrap tire that will come back to New Mexico after being recycled.

Tire cleanups aren't the only thing the solid waste authority has been busy with lately.

EVSWA has recently launched a collaborative program with Torrance County to clean lots that have unsafe, unhealthy and dilapidated mobile homes, and make the properties marketable again, Ellis said.

"All over our county there are abandoned mobile homes," he said. "We're working to get these sites cleaned up so they can be put on to the market. Right now no one even wants to look at them, so to get those properties back in use, it will make neighborhoods better and improve the tax base for the county."

Properties in Echo Ridge and Sunset Acres in Moriarty are scheduled to be cleaned up within the next few weeks, with Echo Ridge set for Friday. All metal, including mobile home frames, will be separated out and baled at the landfill for recycling, Ellis said.

The cleanups have already been paying off.

One residency had been on the market for years, Ellis said, and, after it was cleaned up, the property sold within three weeks.

"We hope that's the kind of response we're going to get when we clean up these properties," he said. "So people will look at them as viable developmental properties."