by DAVID NASHWe visited all of our island government offices to see how they all
stacked up in the effort to recycle. Only one town, Edgartown, has an
“official” recycling coordinator although every town, the county and the
tribal offices all recycle to some extent. There is a significant
benefit to having a coordinator in town hall. It allows for someone to
develop new recycling opportunities while watching out for ways to
improve existing efforts. Edgartown extends their efforts to include
computers and electronics. Most towns however have someone who does
watch out for how well their co-workers are recycling. Some towns even
have two people. Tisbury town hall actually has an “enforcer” and a
“retriever”; two dedicated recyclers who remind and check to see that
their town employees are doing a good job. One comment received from
one town employee addressed the additional benefit of everyone being in
sync with respect to recycling efforts. When these same people are
involved with purchasing the same mind set extends to purchasing
policies such as buying post consumer recycled white paper or maybe even
looking at products with reduced packaging. One town employee reported
that trying to be green with purchasing isn’t always that easy due to
lack of available items as well as high costs; purchasing also occurs
independently in departments within a given town. If our towns and
businesses combined purchases it would perhaps translate into more
widespread use and better affordability. | Small business represents another opportunity that sometimes takes a
little effort. An effective and efficient recycling effort can occur at
the smallest business in conjunction with a trash hauler, or self
hauling as long as everyone cooperates and treats their work environment
just as they would their home recycling efforts. White paper and paper
products are the primary recyclable generated by offices. With single
stream recycling now available, bottles, cans, mixed paper and plastics
are easily handled. Corrugated cardboard is also a frequently recycled
item and one of the recyclables that holds its marketability and value
well. Businesses generating ”confidential” white paper can shred and
bag this paper themselves for recycling or can hire a mobile shredding
company to do that job for them. Recycling in a small office setting requires nothing more than an awareness of what is being discarded. The Martha’s Vineyard Savings Bank has what they refer to as a “recycling team” affectionately called “Sea Green” which works to maximize efforts to keep MV Savings Bank as green as possible. Their team has on-going periodic meetings to oversee their in-house recycling efforts at the various bank offices around the island. People who don’t recycle at home are obviously going to have a hard time recycling at the office and that’s where a little organization helps, such as the use of containers which are color coded or clearly marked. A printed reminder on the office refrigerator can help as well. One business was having a difficult time because their office cleaning company had non-English speaking employees. Printing out some instructions in other languages can quickly remedy that. Next: "On-the-Go" |
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