North Ridgeville Review The Community That Cares
Matt Keller, North Ridgeville Rotary, Brandi Schnell, Community Outreach Coordinator, Lorain County Solid Waste and Michelle Hung, Lorain County Commissioner
The North Ridgeville Rotary invited Brandi Schnell to their Friday, February 12th meeting to be their speaker. She is the Community Outreach Coordinator for the Lorain County Solid Waste Management District, which is a department of the Lorain County Commissioners.
Brandi spoke about the function of a Solid Waste District and some of the special programs offered to residents. One of these special programs is the Lorain County Collection Center, located at 540 S. Abbe Road in Elyria. This center allows Lorain County residents to bring in acceptable items to drop off during their normal business hours (Mondays: 9am – 3pm, Wednesdays: 12pm – 6pm and Saturdays: 9am – 3pm) at no charge.
Acceptable items include electronic scrap material, fluorescent bulbs, household hazardous waste, scrap tires and paper to be shredded. For a complete list of acceptable items please visit our website: loraincounty.us/solidwaste.
Brandi Schnell talked about the history of why the Solid Waste Management District was created and the purpose that it serves today. A focus of the presentation was on how to properly recycle to reduce contamination and ensure the greatest amount of recyclables are being diverted from the Landfill, which as it stands now, only has approximately 14 years of capacity left.
The important takeaway was to only include items in your recycling from the 5 main categories: Metal (aluminum and steel food containers), Cartons (food/beverage containers), Plastic (kitchen, laundry, bath: bottles and jugs), Paper (cereal boxes, newspaper, magazines and flattened cardboard), and Glass (food/beverage bottles and jars). It is important that all items are empty, clean, dry and NOT in a plastic bag. No plastic bags, food waste or food soiled items in your recycling bin.
North Ridgeville receives grant dollars from the Lorain County Solid Waste Management District each year as an incentive for recycling. The more tonnage of recycling, the more money the community receives. North Ridgeville received the second highest amount of community recycling incentive dollars in 2020 for Lorain County. The numbers for 2021 haven’t been completed yet. Examples of projects that North Ridgeville has used these grant dollars on include:
- T-shirts and booklets that promote recycling for the Safetyville program administered by the NR police department
- Refrigerator magnets containing the 2022 reuse/recycling/bulk pick-up schedules that go out to all residents
- Advertising and educational materials for the website, community newsletter, mailers and educational brochures
- Recycled content traffic cones, barrels and barricades
- Benches, chairs, trash receptacles and signs made from recycled content. These items can be seen and used at city parks, entrances of the Police and Fire Stations and the Splash Pad.
- Bandit Intimidator 18XP Chipper for use by the Service Department to chip trees, brush and branches and turn them into mulch. This purchase was subsidized by City Funds.
