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For two decades, Chad Elliott rode freight across the desert as a conductor and locomotive engineer. Now working for Deschutes County Solid Waste, Elliott moves through propane cylinders, paint cans and batteries with the same steady rhythm he once used to keep freight moving.
Elliott started as a landfill attendant before transferring to Household Hazardous Waste in February 2025. The work is hands-on and varied. Cyanide, mercury and leftover cleaners share space with five-gallon buckets of paint and endless batteries.
“We offer a service so if you’re the average person cleaning out the garage or the ranch or the shop, we have an outlet where they can bring in all these items and get disposed of properly,” Elliott says.
Before hazardous waste came 21 years on the railroad, and before that, the Army and a deployment to Iraq after 9-11. The path was not linear, but Elliott talks about it with the clarity of someone who has made peace with the detours.
“This place actually feels like kind of like an extended family working here,” he says.
Family shows up everywhere for Elliott. He talks about his wife, his two adult daughters and his mom who recently moved up from Arizona. There are concerts, hockey games, baseball, mountain biking and two English mastiffs who are perfectly happy to lounge more than exercise. For someone who values quiet routines, the public-facing part of the job has been a surprise.
“I’m kind of an introvert, but I wasn’t uncomfortable at all being with customers,” Elliott says.
The bigger surprise, he says, is how much he enjoys the public. After years in rail freight and the Army, customer service was not exactly expected, yet he welcomes the conversations as people unload the stranger items hiding in garages and sheds.
“I feel like I have a good relationship with the customers,” he says.
Hazardous waste is not glamorous work, but there is satisfaction in helping people offload things they cannot throw away. On busy days, the line moves like freight and Elliott moves with it.
Different cargo, same rhythm.
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