Eco
Auto shops get into the green
By Mike Touzeau
When you and your vehicle limp into a local auto repair shop for service, the last thing on your mind is what the business is trying to do to help the environment. You just want your car fixed.
But behind the scenes at Dave’s Tire and Auto Center on Continental and West Frontage roads, long-time Green Valley auto expert Dave Polsky is going green every chance he gets because he believes it’s the right thing to do.
“I think about the planet and what I’m going to leave my children,” he says.
Polsky learned first-hand where the waste was going when he bought an engine rebuild and auto repair shop years ago in Tucson after moving here from Greenwich, Conn. He never forgot the struggles he went through to do things right and still be able to stay in business.
Coming up on his 10th year as an auto service fixture in Green Valley, Polsky — who has another store on Esperanza Boulevard — feels it’s important to maintain some civic pride, as well.
“I really enjoy the community here. It gives me an opportunity to be part of something.”
Customers & community
Most would never know how much he assists his customers — dropping in on widows to fix something on their house or car, helping folks find services he doesn’t do himself, and free fluid and tire checks for anybody who comes in.
Every repair gets a follow-up phone call, and windows get washed after every oil change.
He’s been named Rotarian of the Year in his Rotary lunch group and is active with the Greater Green Valley Community Foundation and Friends in Deed, conducts regular blood drives for the United Blood Service, sponsors soccer and Little League teams, helps provide phone cards to Armed Forces personnel to call home, and consistently raises money and collects donations for the community food bank.
His second annual car show on Earth Day attracted 200 people, with all the money raised going to the food bank.
Polsky, 49, began by pumping gas when he was 16.
“I started with one gas station and two tow trucks,” he recalls, evolving to four stations and 14 tow trucks, learning the business inside and out, and eventually landing a job as sales rep for a big hydraulic engineering company in Boston.
His own boss again
On the road in luxury hotels, he looked around and realized he missed having his own business.
“I saw guys in their 50s sitting in the hotel bars and knew I didn’t want to end up that way.”
He flew back to Boston after coming out here to visit his girlfriend, whose brother went to UA.
“It was snowing like crazy,” he remembers. “I kissed my mom goodbye and moved to Tucson.”
That was 24 years ago, and after some employment here with Firestone and as a Midas general manager, he knew he wanted to be his own boss again.
“I was working so many hours, I might as well be back in business myself.”
He bought the engine rebuild shop in central Tucson, hired 22 employees, and immediately picked up an education in the process.
Environmental lessons
“When I bought the machine shop, I got a lesson in environmental responsibility,” he says, describing how waste was being dumped on the property and into the local sewer system.
Polsky immediately went about discovering methods to deal with wastewater from cleaning engine blocks, made adjustments to his own sewer system to prevent transfer to the city’s, shoveled waste himself until he could locate appropriate disposal options, and even came up with a way to bake sludge so as to more easily and safely get rid of it.
On one Earth Day, he made a pledge to himself to find better ways to conduct his business and still protect the planet, and he has carried those improvements over to his two shops in Green Valley.
No waste water goes into his sinks, but rather is mixed with waste oil to recycle it. He’s changed his lighting system to use less energy and has cut way back on paper use and printed reports. He recycles anti-freeze, replaced plastic protective seat covers with cotton, recycles used tires for construction, uses swamp coolers in the service bays, accepts customers’ used oil at no charge and recycles pretty much everything he can.
“Every effort is made to make sure no fluid makes it to the soil,” he said, and he’s currently testing ground-up coconut shell as an oil absorbent.
After 33 years in the business, Polsky believes in keeping the planet clean as much as he believes in keeping his customers happy, and he does it 7 a.m. to 6 p.m., Monday through Friday, and 7:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Saturday.
Green Valley resident Mike Touzeau is a freelance writer for the Green Valley News.
But behind the scenes at Dave’s Tire and Auto Center on Continental and West Frontage roads, long-time Green Valley auto expert Dave Polsky is going green every chance he gets because he believes it’s the right thing to do.
“I think about the planet and what I’m going to leave my children,” he says.
Polsky learned first-hand where the waste was going when he bought an engine rebuild and auto repair shop years ago in Tucson after moving here from Greenwich, Conn. He never forgot the struggles he went through to do things right and still be able to stay in business.
Coming up on his 10th year as an auto service fixture in Green Valley, Polsky — who has another store on Esperanza Boulevard — feels it’s important to maintain some civic pride, as well.
“I really enjoy the community here. It gives me an opportunity to be part of something.”
Customers & community
Most would never know how much he assists his customers — dropping in on widows to fix something on their house or car, helping folks find services he doesn’t do himself, and free fluid and tire checks for anybody who comes in.
Every repair gets a follow-up phone call, and windows get washed after every oil change.
He’s been named Rotarian of the Year in his Rotary lunch group and is active with the Greater Green Valley Community Foundation and Friends in Deed, conducts regular blood drives for the United Blood Service, sponsors soccer and Little League teams, helps provide phone cards to Armed Forces personnel to call home, and consistently raises money and collects donations for the community food bank.
His second annual car show on Earth Day attracted 200 people, with all the money raised going to the food bank.
Polsky, 49, began by pumping gas when he was 16.
“I started with one gas station and two tow trucks,” he recalls, evolving to four stations and 14 tow trucks, learning the business inside and out, and eventually landing a job as sales rep for a big hydraulic engineering company in Boston.
His own boss again
On the road in luxury hotels, he looked around and realized he missed having his own business.
“I saw guys in their 50s sitting in the hotel bars and knew I didn’t want to end up that way.”
He flew back to Boston after coming out here to visit his girlfriend, whose brother went to UA.
“It was snowing like crazy,” he remembers. “I kissed my mom goodbye and moved to Tucson.”
That was 24 years ago, and after some employment here with Firestone and as a Midas general manager, he knew he wanted to be his own boss again.
“I was working so many hours, I might as well be back in business myself.”
He bought the engine rebuild shop in central Tucson, hired 22 employees, and immediately picked up an education in the process.
Environmental lessons
“When I bought the machine shop, I got a lesson in environmental responsibility,” he says, describing how waste was being dumped on the property and into the local sewer system.
Polsky immediately went about discovering methods to deal with wastewater from cleaning engine blocks, made adjustments to his own sewer system to prevent transfer to the city’s, shoveled waste himself until he could locate appropriate disposal options, and even came up with a way to bake sludge so as to more easily and safely get rid of it.
On one Earth Day, he made a pledge to himself to find better ways to conduct his business and still protect the planet, and he has carried those improvements over to his two shops in Green Valley.
No waste water goes into his sinks, but rather is mixed with waste oil to recycle it. He’s changed his lighting system to use less energy and has cut way back on paper use and printed reports. He recycles anti-freeze, replaced plastic protective seat covers with cotton, recycles used tires for construction, uses swamp coolers in the service bays, accepts customers’ used oil at no charge and recycles pretty much everything he can.
“Every effort is made to make sure no fluid makes it to the soil,” he said, and he’s currently testing ground-up coconut shell as an oil absorbent.
After 33 years in the business, Polsky believes in keeping the planet clean as much as he believes in keeping his customers happy, and he does it 7 a.m. to 6 p.m., Monday through Friday, and 7:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Saturday.
Green Valley resident Mike Touzeau is a freelance writer for the Green Valley News.
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