Tahoe’s Dirtiest Jobs
Google “dirtiest jobs in America” and you’ll see that wastewater treatment operator, plumber, and basically anything that works with harsh or hazardous materials and gross-yet-necessary systems. Even in beautiful Lake Tahoe, these jobs exist and are especially important in the summer months when we have an influx of tourists. Here are horror stories, success stories, and words of advice for residents and visitors alike from those working behind the scenes in Tahoe’s dirtiest jobs:
Lead Technician/Senior Plumber Brendan Dugan at Lake Tahoe Plumbing & Heating
As a plumber for 26 years now, Brendan Dugan has done hundreds of jobs, primarily in South Lake Tahoe. He’s seen a lot in his time fixing pipes for commercial businesses and residential properties, but a couple of jobs stand out.
“There’s a mega-mansion here in South Lake Tahoe that has a very large sewage injection pump system about 10-12 feet deep (and four feet wide), and the pumps seized inside of it,” Dugan recalls. With the pumps down toward the bottom of the tank, there was only one way to free the pumps.
“I had to put on a respirator and hazmat suit and climb in there, basically into the bowels of hell,” he chuckles. Even though most of the sewage was removed, Dugan still had to work in standing water/fecal matter with waders on to disconnect the pumps and hoist them out.
“I told the owners that if anyone flushes a toilet when I’m down in the sewage pit, then I will respond with violence,” he says.
Another incident involved Dugan checking the pipes underneath someone’s vacation home and shimmying into the crawl space to find a current resident.
“[The house] hadn’t been lived in in 10 years and the owners wanted to make it into a short-term rental,” Dugan says. “I’m always the first one into a crawl space, and I had a younger coworker with me at the time, and when I went under the house, I was face-to-face with a growling bear. My coworker had to yank me out by my ankles!”
Dugan always wears a respirator because there are different threats, whether it’s in a sewage tank or in a crawl space. “Raccoon feces can get you quite sick. They are cute but disgusting creatures.”
So why does Dugan do a job that sends him “into the bowels of hell”?
“It keeps me busy. This job is a puzzle…I like to figure out why [a plumbing issue] happened and how to fix it,” he says.
Dugan initially started out his career as a pastry and sous chef in New Jersey before moving to Lake Tahoe and says he “went from making people have to go to the bathroom to cleaning them.” While he says it can be hard finding people who want to work with their hands, a plumbing career is something AI can’t replace.
“I’ve learned so much over the years; I want to start an apprenticeship program. It’s a good career, good honest work, but it can be brutal on your body,” he explains. On the toughest worksites, he says, “you just have to bite your bottom lip and give it hell, get the job done.”
Garbage sorters at Tahoe Truckee Sierra Disposal (TTSD) Eastern Regional Landfill
Family owned and operated, the TTSD transfer station at the top of Cabin Creek Road facing the slopes of Northstar California is likely the most scenic and better-smelling garbage collection/processing agencies anywhere in Northern California, it being surrounded by the Tahoe National Forest.
Originally opening in 1973, TTSD/the Eastern Regional Landfill Facility contracts with Placer County to perform trash collection and sorting in North Lake Tahoe/Truckee. In 1995, it added a Material Recovery Facility (MRF) that was considered cutting-edge at the time and inadvertently still makes things much easier on the customer by keeping its simple “you toss, we sort” mission. The MRF is set up to move trash along in an organized manner, as a crew of human sorters works both sides of a second story conveyor belt pulling out trash and dropping it into appropriate bins below. From the bins, the trash gets tipped onto a conveyor belt, flows into the baler, and then is sold off to secondary manufacturers.
As we walked along the tipping floor, Placer County Environmental Resources Specialist Corie Heisler pointed out the mixed piles, the crane, the front loader, and baler. It was cleaner and smelled better than I expected, although the only other dump I had ever been to was the one up in Redding, Calif.
The TTSD has brokers who buy certain materials from them and what they are looking for fluctuates. Heisler says there are steady markets for plastics one and two, glass, and cardboard, but the TTSD is flexible on what it can sell. TTSD is unique in that there aren’t any separate bins for recycling and regular trash. It’s all dumped into the same truck and sorted by hand.
“We view the blue bag as a benefit to the public because it’s a free service, but all the trash gets touched and sorted,” says Heisler. And since everything is sorted out by hand, buyers know exactly what they’re getting.
Looking at all types of things going down the sorting line, I wondered if it’s hard to see brand new or nice things thrown away.
“It is a bummer when people throw things away with the price tags still on them. Once we got a beautiful brand-new crystal chandelier; I guess people bought it and decided they didn’t want it for their house, so they just threw it away,” Heisler says. She encourages people to put that kind of stuff on Facebook Marketplace or take it to the thrift store; since there are strict regulations on scavenging, something like that will have to be broken down and processed just like any other piece of garbage which is a lot more costly.
There is a seasonality to what kind of trash is generated, too. “We see a lot more bottles and cans in July and ski paraphernalia in winter,” says Heisler, emphasizing that the TTSD likes to see people reduce, reuse, and consider how they can give stuff a second life so that “it never comes to us.”
When asked what some of the more unusual things they’ve seen are, they light up.
“One customer called and his $5,000 hearing aids were missing. He knew what truck they came on, and we all looked for them…and found them! They were in this little, tiny earbud-like pouch,” says the MRF manager.
Another time, one woman went to mail a FedEx package of two diamond rings, but they somehow ended up in the trash instead. Again, everyone working that day tracked them down and found them in the MRF. That’s what’s nice about living in the small North Lake Tahoe/Truckee community with every piece of trash overseen by a real person…you have a better chance of catching something that wasn’t meant to be thrown away.
In talking about the worst things they’ve come across, TTSD Operations Manager Chris Park mentions firearms and ammunition. “We have to call the sheriff when we find those, because otherwise we’re in illegal possession of a firearm,” he says.
“And don’t throw away batteries, of any kind, because they do start fires,” adds Heisler. Vapes are Heisler’s pet peeve at the moment because it’s a battery that can catch fire encased in plastic with nicotine, a federally regulated substance.
“Vapes have two hazardous materials. Companies create new products not thinking of the end of life of that product,” says Heisler. Fortunately, California SB 54 puts that responsibility back on manufacturers through the Plastic Pollution Prevention and Packaging Producer Responsibility Act signed into law in 2022, making manufacturers think twice about their packaging sitting around forever in a landfill.
Trash collectors at Tahoe Truckee Sierra Disposal (TTSD)
Before the sorters can sort, TTSD’s fleet of garbage trucks is out on any given day with collectors visiting around 600 houses in their shift. Park had been with TTSD for eight years, starting out as a driver, becoming TTSD’s film and video editor, and now acting as its operations manager.
“You really get to know the area being a route driver,” he says, as we watch two collectors open bear boxes and carry cans to unload in the back of the truck. When asked if there’s anything residents or visitors can do to make a garbage collector’s job easier, Park replies, “Make sure the cans aren’t too heavy, and that they’re tied. There’s a lot more pollution when garbage isn’t in a bag because then it’s susceptible to blowing around in the wind and then they have to go around and pick up that litter.”
Overfilled cans are a problem because then the collectors must pull them, and animals getting into a can make a huge mess.
Whether a person is a trash collector or a trash sorter, working for them doesn’t seem to be all that bad.
“Sixty percent of our workforce have been working here for at least 15 years; one person just retired after 35 years. It’s always consistent work providing a stable income. Even families work here,” says Heisler. Since many of its workers live in Reno, TTSD sends vans to pick employees up in, which is especially helpful when gas is over $5 a gallon.
Utility Operations Manager Ken Fischer at North Tahoe PUD
“Ironically, our utility jobs aren’t that dirty unless something really unexpected happens,” says North Tahoe PUD Government & Community Affairs Manager Justin Broglio. Water repair crews are often down in ditches and trenches repairing old leaking pipes and that can be muddy, but there is no wastewater or hazard materials involved. And even when the wastewater crews sometimes have to climb down into a manhole to inspect a pipe or make a repair, they have full protective suits, respirators and return air supplies with them. They also clean out sewer pump stations annually and inspect the pumps/equipment using NTPUD large vacuum trucks and pressure washers.
Ken Fischer has been the utility operations manager at NTPUD for 10 years, and oversees the team that inspects fire hydrants, exercises water main valves, inspects manholes, hydro-flush wastewater mains, and answers customer requests involving their water service or wastewater blockages. They also respond to watermain or wastewater spills/backup emergencies.
When asked if Fischer has had any unique experiences on the job, he says dealing with an unexpected geyser always wakes him up. “Water main leaks are always challenging. When a leak is on the bottom of the pipe the repair is easier, but when the leak is on the top of the pipe it becomes much more interesting. As soon as the leak is exposed, the water can come shooting out of the hole and you are getting soaking wet while trying to install a clamp around the pipe and then you need to tighten the bolts with around 80 to 100 PSI of water trying to push the clamp open. If this happens, by the time you are done with the leak repair you can be covered in mud and soaking wet, but the feeling of accomplishment and fixing that pipe to restore water service is exhilarating,” he says.
As far as what residents and visitors can do to make their job easier, Fischer recommends, “NTPUD residents and visitors are our eyes in the field. It is extremely helpful to notify us of any unusual water running pooling on the street, running down the road, or shooting out of the ground. This helps us locate water leaks faster and helps reduce water loss from our water system.
“If a customer or someone visiting the area has a wastewater backup in their home, please call us first before you call a plumber. We will come out at no charge and can usually be there within a one-hour window (usually within 30 minutes), and we can figure out if the issue is on our side of the wastewater system or on the customer side. If it is on our side, it will be addressed immediately. If it is on the customer side, we will advise the customer of what needs to be done.”
Editor’s note: This article originally appeared in the Summer 2026 edition of Tahoe Magazine.
