It’s a good time to recycle and reduce holiday waste on the curb, officials say

Amid all the wonderful gifts, great food and fellowship with friends and relatives, your household waste is expected to more than double during the holidays.

The days after Christmas are the heaviest for crews picking up waste from the curb, said Pat Biegler, director of Public Works. Instead of picking up the normal 1,300 tons of waste, crews are tackling more than double with an average of 3,000 tons during the Christmas week.

“It’s a very, heavy week,” she said. “A lot of it is boxes, more food stuff. It’s just about everything.”

Biegler and other officials agree the holidays are a good time to recycle as much as possible to reduce the amount of waste going to the city’s landfill. There will be more opportunities to recycle plastic No. 1-7, cardboard, paper including envelopes, magazines, junk mail, etc., aluminum and steel cans.

Gloria Weston-Smart, director of Keep Columbus Beautiful, said the holidays bring an increased use of paper products but not so much for plastic.

“Usually they are cooking a lot,” Weston-Smart said. “They are going to use a whole lot of tissue paper, paper towel. All of those rolls , the tube, all of that can be recycled. People don’t think about recycling those.”

To reduce waste, many people are turning to gift bags because they don’t have to worry about wrapping the gift boxes.

In the kitchen, Weston-Smart said so much food is cooked, including cans of green beans, corn and other vegetables. “We are consuming a lot of drinks during that time so all those cans can be recycled,” she said. “Any boxed products they are buying, whether it’s cereal, rice or any type food item, this is the time we eat more than what we give.”

Cutting back on the trash and increasing recycling leave Weston-Smart with just one bag during a two-week period. The rest of her waste is recycled.

“They need to cut back on the amount of trash they put in trash cans,” she said. “Fill those recycling bins up.”

Biegler offered some tips to prevent contamination of recycled items. One of the biggest rejected items is Styrofoam, which should go into the trash along with the plastic pillows and film or wrap used for packing.

“We have been less particular in past but the more contamination, the more we have to slow the line down,” she said. “We would ask that they watch for those three things. Put them in the trash and not recycling.”

To prevent thefts of your flat screen TV, Biegler said break down the boxes to reduce visibility of the item. “If you got several boxes , they would have to dig to see the label and minimize visibility.”

If you want to recycle, watch for the new schedule during the holidays. Monday and Tuesday are holidays for the pickup crews.

Monday’s route will be collected on Wednesday.

Tuesday’s route will be collected on Thursday.

Thursday’s route will be collected on Friday.

Friday’s route will be collected on Saturday.

The city will run a Saturday crew to keep the waste from piling up on the curb, Biegler said. “Stuff stacks up after Christmas and people are not very happy to have it around,” she said.

Biegler and Weston-Smart said recycling will make a difference in the amount of waste. “Any help is appreciated,” Biegler said.

That’s the way I look at recycling. I’m not as skilled as Weston-Smart but I separate quite a bit of paper and other items every week. I collected about 50 pounds to recycle on one heavy day. It’s money in our pockets by saving landfill space.

If you’ve seen something that needs attention, give me a call at 706-571-8576.

This story was originally published December 23, 2018 at 1:21 PM with the headline "It’s a good time to recycle and reduce holiday waste on the curb, officials say."