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Grant to Help With Disposal of Electronics

Posted on: Monday, 26 September 2005, 18:00 CDT

By Stowe, Gene

A state grant will help the Solid Waste Management District of St. Joseph County increase awareness of the need for electronics management and safe disposal. The $58,450 IDEM grant for education from this year through 2007 is part of the Indiana Recycling Coalition's Electronics Scrap Action Program (ESAP).

"It is intended primarily for the hiring of a professional design group to create an education campaign," says Mark Mehall, the district's executive director. The district has been collecting electronics since March 2002.

It's another step for the district, which started in 1991 with recycling centers for standard recyclables such as newspapers, glass and aluminum cans and has seen waste going to the landfill reduced by more than one-third.

"We started off small-scale," Mehall says. The district's ninemember board of directors includes mayors of South Bend and Mishawaka, three St. Joseph County commissioners, one St. Joseph County council member, council members from South Bend and Mishawaka and one small city representative.

The district won the 2000 Governor's Award for Excellence in Recycling for a media campaign in cooperation with Lake, LaPorte and Porter County districts.

A household hazardous waste collection center at 1105 E. Fifth St. in Mishawaka, operated jointly with the city, was one of the fast in the state and is considered a model by state officials. That's where the electronics disposal is also handled.

St. Joseph County residents can deliver electronics to the site 8:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday. Electronics from businesses or institutions are accepted only through prior arrangement with the district.

The fee is $12 per item for large items such as arcade size video games, camcorders, desktop PCs, fax machines, pinball machines, power tools, electronic scales, sewing machines, speakers television, word processors and video game players such as Nintendo and PlayStation.

Smaller items, such as calculators, cameras, Gameboys, radios postage machines and telephone answering machines are free.

The district also promotes composting efforts, including yard waste pickup and public education.

Its largest program is curbside recycling collection, started in 1999 everywhere except Mishawaka and Walkerton, who have their own collection arrangements, and Lakeville, Indian Village, Roseland and Osceola.

The district collected 13,210 tons of recyclables in 2002, 12,970 tons in 2003 and 13,283 tons last year, when participants were no longer required to separate their recyclable items.

The program takes clear, brown, and green glass; No. 1 through No. 5 and No. 7 plastics; aluminum and steel cans; newsprint; cardboard, junk mail, phone books, magazines and softback books.

A user fee of $2.70 per month for curbside recycling and $2 per ton for disposal at the Prairie View RDF landfill support the district. A free drop-off facility is available for residents and business at the processing facility where the materials from the curbside program are weighed and delivered.

Solid Waste Management District Of St. Joseph County is located at 621 E. Jefferson Blvd. in South Bend.

Copyright South Bend Tribune Corporation Aug 22, 2005

Source: Tribune Business Weekly

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