“We want to see that participation increase,” Gilleland said. “We encourage recycling, but I reminded my entire staff to be mindful of sensitive information and to ensure those items are properly disposed of.”
Dave Duritsch, director of public works and utilities, said the city has been pursuing recycling incentive programs for several months, even before the issue over confidential documents hit.
“Recycling is on its own path and disposing sensitive information is on another,” Duritsch said. “But when those two paths come together, we need to make sure problems don’t occur.”
Several parks throughout Middletown will see new recycling centers installed within the coming weeks, Duritsch said, in addition to single-stream drop boxes that allow paper, glass and plastic to be commingled.
“We’d like to see everything put in place before the holiday tournaments,” he said. “It’s part of Rumpke’s efforts to expand, but at the same time we want to provide more opportunities to recycle.”
The city has been working with Keep Middletown Beautiful on the push to reinvigorate the recycling program, according to Duritsch. Jeff Michel, executive director with the group, said he would like to see Middletown begin to show improvements other Butler County communities have exhibited.
“We live in a socioeconomic area where people are used to kind of throwing stuff out the window,” Michel said. “We’re not trying to force anyone to recycle, but our goal is to move from the bottom of the list closer to the top where a community like Oxford is.”
Michel said the city also has been working with Rumpke to start a pilot program that would see 65-gallon recycling cans given to customers rather than the traditional bin. Program participants will be asked to pay $1 a month for the service, Michel said.
“If we can show through a pilot program that it’s working, perhaps we can talk about how to negotiate that into our contract with Rumpke,” Michel said.
Contact this reporter at (513) 705-2871 or at rgauthier@coxohio.com.
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