The Alpine/Viejas Fire Safety Council is holding its Operation Chip Drop on May 18 on the Viejas Reservation at the Viejas Recreation Center from 8-11 a.m. This widespread community cleanup event is to help Alpine homeowners with large items such as mattresses, appliances, water heaters, recycling tires, e-waste, metal, lightbulbs, and green chip waste to be chipped, which helps the local hillsides clear and free of litter. An AVFSC chipper will be onsite to chip green waste. This event does not accept oil, paints, cars, or motorcycles.
The AVFSC’s first Operation Chip Drop in February resulted in EDCO collecting 19.09 tons of trash dropped off by 100 cars over the three-hour period. Over 125 tires were collected, along with 200 pounds of batteries.
AVFSC Board President Steve Taylor and Alpine Fire Protection District Fire Marshall Jason McBroom are heading the operations.
“The very first event was very well received,” said McBroom. “Community members from Descanso, Pine Valley, Jamul, and Alpine all showed up.”
McBroom said for the event, everything is arranged, and participants caravan in with about 50 cars in each line and they will direct each car where to go.
“It is very well organized,” he said. “We have the nonprofit Team Rubicon, a nonprofit that volunteers to help, and they are a huge helping unload the trailers and piling all the rubbish inside containers. The chipping event is provided free to the residents here in Alpine.”
McBroom said along with events like this, AVFSC is specifically designed to provide public education, community outreach, free roadside chipping, and defensible space assistance to senior citizens, fixed-income, or physically disabled residents.
McBroom said for chipping, the Alpine Fire Protection district now owns a new Vermeer BC100 chipper secured by a grant in partnership with the San Diego Regional Fire Foundation with funds provided by the San Diego River Conservancy.
“We use the chipper to chip green waste material that will be brought to the event,” he said.
Taylor said it is a very large chipper which can hold 12-inch diameter branches.
“It is bigger than anything you would probably see in a rental yard,” he said.
Proof of residency for the event is not necessary, but participants will be asked what community they are coming from, so they can gather data on how far people drove to get rid of their rubbish.
Taylor said these chipping events, they will go to the residents and do the chipping onsite for them for free. He said after the devastating fires that have gone through the community, that regulations have now come together at the state level, one of the things that Alpine leads in, is becoming a fire-wise community.
“There are four fire-wise communities in San Diego County now, but we were the first for many years,” he said.
