MARSHALL — They’ve tried education. They’ve tried talking to people. But Lyon County environmental staff said it hasn’t stopped people from using community recycling bins in Marshall as a free garbage service.

“I think it’s become a bad habit,” said Lyon County environmental technician and education coordinator Stephanie Bethke-DeJaeghere.

County environmental staff are planning to move ahead with relocating the Marshall recycling drop-off site from the former County Fair property to the county fairgrounds. The location would make it easier to keep an eye on the bins, said environmental administrator Roger Schroeder.

After discussing the problem, county commissioners gave their support for the move.

Problems with bagged recyclables or just plain trash being put in the county bins have continued over the course of the year. The last time Schroeder brought the problem up to the county board was in August.

Now, Schroeder said, “it’s a weekly occurrence” to find improperly dumped materials in the bins.

County staff have found lots of recyclables tossed in the bins inside plastic bags, although that’s not allowed. They’ve also found items that don’t belong in the recycling bins at all.

“We’ve had a gas furnace in there, and multiple TVs,” Schroeder said.

“We started taking pictures of what we’ve been finding,” Bethke-DeJaeghere said. She said environmental staff have tried putting out information on Facebook, and talking with people at the recycling site, but it hasn’t stopped trash from showing up, along with improperly disposed-of recyclables.

Schroeder and Bethke-DeJaeghere said moving the recycling drop-off site to the Lyon County fairgrounds would put it closer to the environmental office, and allow for possible installation of surveillance cameras.

“We are going to put cameras at the fairgrounds,” Schroeder said. He said the environmental office had purchased security cameras for the Household Hazardous Waste drop-off site, which has also had problems with people leaving waste outside the door when the site is closed.

Moving the recycling bins wouldn’t be an immediate solution. Commissioner Rick Anderson said the county would first have to talk to Marshall Municipal Utilities to ask about mounting cameras on utility poles at the fairgrounds.

But as commissioners discussed the problem, commissioners agreed they couldn’t let people continue to abuse the recycling site.

“We’ve got to follow through and do something,” Commissioner Charlie Sanow said.

The question of when the recycling site will move depends on when the security cameras can be installed, Schroeder said. He would likely know more later this month, he said.