Letter to the Editor: Quarry querry

To the Editor:
Some Allamakee quarry owners were at a recent meeting of the Board of Supervisors. Last year one quarry company received 95% of the flood work and the other quarries in the county received the other 5%, according to one quarry owner’s information.
Our Allamakee County Engineer said it was because there is always someone at that quarry and they have more quarries. We assume he meant there was someone at these quarries to drive the end loader and an end loader there. He added that the quarry company has its own trucks. Well, the quarry across the road does not have someone in it all the time. And the trucks going in and out lately have been Allamakee County trucks. And since the end loader only shows up now and then, there is not an end loader there all the time. The end loader belongs to Allamakee County, at least the one that was just there.
That sure would make running a quarry easy if Allamakee County furnished the trucks, truck drivers, the end loader, the fuel for the end loader and trucks and their upkeep. Then all the quarries could sell rock cheap. Their only investment would be the crushing of the rock and the scales. And this quarry’s scale isn’t the type of scale our County Engineer said he wants quarries to have. The scale does not have a time stamp, it does not have electricity. These were some of the grievances our Allamakee County Engineer had with the other quarries.
So, is our Allamakee County Engineer saying, “Do what I say, not what I do”?
And for those who have asked why a quarry company would haul rock into a quarry, you will have to ask them. We can make a guess.

Dan Bechtel, Waukon
Dean and Sherry Bechtel,
Monona