by Gretchen Wing

Special to the Weekly

Lopezians know our dump is unique; who else uses a capital “D” for dump?

Most know it takes dozens of volunteers to run; many know it won Recycler of the Year in May.

Few know the behind-the-scenes wizardry that took our dump from ballot to booth.

Povl Lasbo is a dump wizard. Early in 2012, he said, “I was dumb enough to mention that I am a systems analyst and could help with whatever system was needed to run the People’s Dump.”

Once the levy was planned, board member Larry Eppenbach took Lasbo up on his offer.  Eppenbach brought in Bill Clemens, who had also volunteered to help implement a point-of-sale system for transactions at the kiosk. Board member Bruce Creps joined the group to brainstorm the dump’s requirements. They settled for a web-based system, allowing this small group of wizards to work it from home.

And work they did. Once the levy passed in November 2012, Lasbo, Clemens and Creps had only eight weeks to get the system, known as LISSY (Lopez Island Solidwaste System) operational. For Lasbo, “It was a more than full-time project … with much anxiety over whether it could be done…working reliably and tested in time.”

The nail-chewing paid off upon opening when, “to the great joy of Bob [Chonka] and Neil [Hanson] it not only worked, but  worked much easier and more reliably than the county system had.”

The wizards’ reward was a new task: design a system for volunteer coordination – now.

The new dump required a coordinator to manage more than 100 shifts per month, with volunteers able to select shifts and view schedules from home. Once they determined what was needed, Lasbo, Clemens and Eppenbach completed the new system, with helpful input from the first volunteer coordinator, Micki Ryan. Since neither part of LISSY offered any models to follow, the only troubleshooting course was, as Lasbo tells it, “Find out, work like crazy, find out more and make changes, and then test, test, test and keep your fingers crossed and your breath bated on launch day and every opening day for a long time thereafter.” The work never ends. Says Lasbo, “Nobody really understands how even a small change can take hours or days because it…affects many other places in the system, and has to be thoroughly tested and then monitored for a while.”

Now three years into the process, Lasbo, who analyzed and designed systems for the U.N., ran a computer software company, and now operates SalishRocks Web Design and the systems and websites for Lopez Community Center and Lopez Farmers Market, and many other nonprofits, businesses and private websites –  continues to find LISSY challenging.  LISSY “is the most complex system I have had to do singly. Others … involved a team of analysts, programmers and testers.”

On Lopez, that “team” role has fallen to Clemens and Creps, whom Lasbo calls “invaluable for their input, comments and testing … Without them it couldn’t have happened.” Eventually, the board hopes to shift more administrative and managerial tasks to paid staff, but Creps says much is currently done by volunteers: “not as visible as the operational work that staff and volunteers so handily perform, but essential.”

Many Lopezians don’t know how much of the dump’s daily operations are subsidized by volunteers, says current board chair Sandy Bishop. Treasurer Bruce Creps also fills the CFO position and Dan Post drives the dump’s truck off-island, each saving thousands of dollars annually, and volunteer coordinator Carol Steckler puts in hundreds of hours implementing that system. Passage of the upcoming dump levy, says Bishop, “shows us that the community has our back.”

Levy passage would also allow LISSY’s wizards and other volunteers to maintain low garbage rates and low-cost or free recycling, while proceeding with 2016 plans for repaving the lower lot and adding covered storage and work areas.

It would also make those hard-working wizards very happy.