A small amount of money to fund a signi f icant program

In these days when everyone, well, almost everyone, is concerned about the environment, it's surprising that anyone is balking even the tiniest bit at pledging the paltry sum of $180,000 a year to keep the household hazardous waste facility in Naperville up and running.

Some $100,000 - more than half the money to run the facility at Naperville's Fire Station No. 4 on Brookdale Road - comes from DuPage County. The city of Naperville kicks in $20,000. The facility is also supported by the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency, the city of Aurora, Kane County and, until now, Will County.

This is changing, though not a great deal.

Will County has removed its $25,000 donation from its 2008-09 budget because it is planning on building its own hazardous waste facility southeast of Joliet.

Overall, that is good news.

Currently, there are only three such facilities in the state, which makes disposal of household hazardous waste - materials such as oil-based paints, pesticides, stains, varnish, auto fluids and the like - very much a regional and state concern.

The other two are in Rockford and Chicago, so if the one in Naperville should close, residents would have to drive to one of those or, presumably, the new one to be built south of Joliet, to get rid of their hazardous materials.

Obviously, the further away a facility is, the less likely people will be to use it and the more likely they will be to put their hazardous wastes in the trash and/or dump fluids down the sink - both of which are bad choices for the environment.

The $25,000 shortfall caused by Will County pulling out means the money must come from elsewhere.

Other DuPage County municipalities are not asked to contribute because DuPage County itself is a funding partner.

Naperville City Councilman Doug Krause said that if the city is unable to get funds elsewhere, he would support a proposal for Naperville to pony up the rest of the dough.

Since Naperville has taken the lead on this from the start, we see no problem with our city picking up the ball when others drop it.

After all, $25,000 is such small potatoes to this city government that it doesn't even qualify as a couple of spoonfuls of potato soup.

And if not polluting the environment is a societal goal, which it is and should be, keeping this facility open and encouraging people to use it is too important a goal to be blocked for lack of a piddling amount of money.