A local business will accept glass bottles for crushing and reuse starting this weekend.

Bigfoot Auto owner Paul Nelson said he’s trying the idea to see if the local market for ditch and drainfield fill material, combined with a five-cents per pound charge, makes the venture profitable.

Nelson, whose company currently recycles car batteries and automobiles, called the idea an experiment. "We’ll just crush the glass with a D-6 in the yard out back. It’s just an idea. We’ll see how far it goes. I’d like to find something to do with the space now that we’re not running buses." Bigfoot Auto lost the local school bus contract this year.

Storage of crushed glass doesn’t require a state landfill permit.

He said the proposal is not a first step toward an expanded private recycling effort. Nelson’s proposal to house non-profit Haines Friends of Recycling’s drop-off station at his bus barn was rejected by the recycling board last week. "There’s no way I’m going to get into recycling (of other things). Recycling has to be done by a non-profit."

Nelson said he had hoped to set up "one-stop" garbage-recycling program in association with HFR at Bigfoot, processing recyclables and shipping non-recyclables to Skagway and Juneau for incineration. Although the recycling board voted down the idea last week, Nelson said he’s open to cooperating with the recycling program in the future. "If they come back and want to talk some more, okay. If not that’s just fine, I’ll go on to something else."

Nelson said he’s considering responding to the Haines Borough’s request for proposals to ship garbage out of Haines.

Bigfoot Auto will accept glass bottles Saturday 10 a.m.to 2 p.m. A 20-pound minimum is required.

Haines Sanitation charges a $35 minimum to dispose of up to 250 pounds of garbage, a rate of 14 cents per pound.