Program grows — 05/06/08

Sat, May 17 2008

— Russell Mayor Bill Hopkins admits that the city’s new recycling program is “exactly” like the one Ashland started last October. And why not? Ashland’s program has been so successful that it is an idea worth copying, not only in Russell but in other area communities.
In launching the city’s own volunteer recycling program, Hopkins said Russell copied Ashland’s program “as close as we could because I think Ashland has been very successful in that program. We want to do the same thing.”
Since Ashland placed large collection containers at four locations around the city last October, Rumpke Consolidated Companies of Hanging Rock, Ohio, has been picking up between 18 tons and 20 tons of recyclable trash from the containers each month. That represents tons of trash that will be recycled into new products instead of buried in a landfill.
Russell launched its recycling program Thursday with containers at Skyline Chili, just off U.S. 23 near the Golden Corral, and in a city parking lot off Ky. 244 in downtown Russell. There are two containers at each location, but more will be placed if there is a demand.
Just as in Ashland, Russell is leasing the collection containers from Rumpke, which will empty them on a weekly basis. Again like Ashland, residents do not have to separate the recyclable goods. That will be done at the Rumpke facility in Hanging Rock. Just about any recyclable product except glass will be accepted.
Hopkins credits Russell resident Carolyn Warnock with helping to launch the city’s program through a letter writing campaign. If the drop-box program works out well, the mayor said the city will consider another recycling program that could have a larger impact on residents: Curb-side recycling. Requiring residents and businesses to separate recyclables from their trash is the most effective way of promoting recycling and reducing the amount of trash buried in landfills. However, the containers where residents voluntarily take their recyclable seem to be the next best thing to mandatory curbside recycling.
The Russell recycling program will continue for at least eight months. If it proves successful — and we think it will — it will be extended.
Discussions are underway to extend Ashland’s program to include Catlettsburg and all of rural Boyd County. Let us hope they are the next to join Ashland and Russell in promoting recycling.