Change is coming for Liberty Township recycling program

LIBERTY

The township is going through a change in its recycling program starting next week.

Residents were mailed a flyer explaining those changes, and they also had an opportunity to ask questions during a presentation Monday night at the township building.

John McGoran, manager of municipal services for Republic Services, the township’s waste hauler, led the presentation.

The township is moving from recycling every week with 33-gallon tubs to every other week with 95-gallon wheeled carts.

The carts are being delivered this week. A schedule indicating recycling weeks through September 2015 is included with the flyer.

McGoran told residents that the idea behind the change is to increase the amount of recyclables per family. He used Plum Borough, a community near Pittsburgh, as an example. Plum’s recycling increased 85 percent in five months, data showed.

Garbage bills will not increase for the new carts, which will be collected by a robotic arm on the trucks.

They will stay at $46.83 a quarter.

One bulk item, such as a couch, chair or television, will be collected for free each month.

McGoran said people should keep their carts at least three to four feet away from mailboxes, cars and other objects so the arms have enough room to work.

Starting Monday, the 33-gallon yellow tubs residents have are no longer permitted to be placed at the curb. Those tubs can be used to collect recyclables inside homes to feed the larger carts, the flyer suggests.

McGoran gave a lesson on what’s acceptable and what isn’t for recycling, which is also listed on the flyer.

“Deli trays — we don’t want them,” he said. “Styrofoam disintegrates in the plant’s tumblers. No plastic shopping bags.”

They also don’t want diapers, plastic wrapping film, aerosol cans, grass clippings, leaves and branches, window glass, dishes, mirrors, plastic utensils plastic or wire hangers or paper plates. Pizza boxes are OK if they aren’t too food-soaked.

White plastic is OK, he said, but not the five-gallon drums you get from home improvement stores, because they’re too big.

Recycling, said McGoran, “is so much more than what’s in your kitchen.”

He said that in the laundry room, laundry soap bottles and fabric softener boxes are some examples of recyclables.

In the bathroom, toothpaste boxes and shampoo bottles count.

In the den, magazines, newspapers and junk mail can go into the cart.

Nothing needs to be bundled or sorted, he said.

Cardboard, shoeboxes, and Christmas wrapping can all be recycled.

For more information, email LibertyTownshipOH@republicservices.com.