By all accounts, last weekend’s collection of household hazardous waste and electronics recycling was a success.
St. Joseph County Solid Waste Committee Secretary Pat Kulikowski said Saturday’s four-hour collection netted 9,000 pounds of household hazardous waste, 1,000 cans of latex paint, 40,000 pounds of electronics, 600 tires, half a semi-trailer of paper and two fully loaded trailers of appliances.
For the sake of comparison, the 2018 fall collection netted 5,800 pounds of household hazardous waste, 27,000 pounds of electronics and 260 tires.
Kulikowski said she always appreciates the fact that people hang on to their difficult-to-dispose-of items and wait to discard them in an environmentally friendly manner.
As always, the fall collection yielded a smaller quantity than spring. Though Kulikowski said the weather Saturday – cool, calm and mostly sunny – was a likely factor in a stronger-than-usual fall turnout.