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ALPENA — Michigan has mandated that counties replace their current solid waste management plans with new materials management plans that focus on sustainable approaches such as recycling and composting instead of just landfilling waste.

Alpena County, which is working with neighboring counties, has until July 5 to complete a notice of intent to draft the new plan and three years to develop the plan and have it approved by the state.

To assist with that transition, the state will make grants available to counties to help cover the cost of developing and implementing the new plans, with additional funds allocated for multi-county planning areas.

On Tuesday, the Alpena County Board of Commissioners decided to work with a consultant, Resource Recycling Systems of Ann Arbor, that is currently working with the newly formed Northeast Michigan Materials Management Authority, which plans to build a new recycling center on M-32 near Airport Road.

County Administrator Mary Catherine Hannah said that, in a lot of ways, Alpena County and its partners are ahead of the game. Because of that, other counties may be interested in joining a coalition to craft a plan and rake in the extra state money to help get plans set into action.

“We are officially on the clock and we have 180 days to prepare and submit a notice of intent to the state,” Hannah said. “Even if some of the other counties choose to go with a different planner, we can still jointly plan and coordinate together.”

The notice of intent informs the state that the county will assume authority over the materials plan. If the commissioners had opted out of developing and implementing the plan, the Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy would have developed a materials plan from them.

The state instituted the idea of having counties have material management plans when it updated Michigan’s Solid Waste Program. Amendments to Part 115 of the Solid Waste Management, of the Natural Resources and Environmental Protection Act, laid out the plans for counties to address recyclable material and focus less on materials that people throw into the garbage and end up in landfills.

Commissioner Burt Francisco said because the Northeast Michigan Council of Governments hasn’t rescinded with a proposal, RRS was the logical choice to help with the work needed in drafting the notice of intent, developing the plan, and implementing it.

“My feeling is, since RRS is the consulting firm that is working directly with the authority, the NMMMA, to develop and build the recycling facility, they would be a hand-in-glove cooperative effort,” he said. “NEMCOG could do it, but they just haven’t stepped up to provide us a proposal to act on, but I don’t think we should delay this.”

Hannah said if there is a multi-county plan, the extra money the state will allocate to the Alpena area could be used by smaller counties to help get their recycling programs off the ground.

“They would be able to use the money not needed for planning to buy recycling bins, paying for transportation to recycling centers,” Hannah said.