The City of Akron in partnership with Keep Akron Beautiful, is conducting the next round of the Recycle Right campaign in Akron. The鈥�Recycle Right鈥�campaign is a community-wide initiative to improve the quality of recycling in curbside carts by providing residents personalized and real-time curbside recycling education and feedback.鈥赌赌�听
The initiative鈥攔unning Monday, June 23 through Friday, August 15鈥攚ill again include mobilizing specially-trained personnel to conduct curbside cart observations.鈥� Residents who have contaminants (non-recyclables) in their recycling carts will receive informational 鈥淥ops鈥� tags on their carts with direct feedback designed to improve recycling cart contents (example available ).鈥� Recycling carts found to contain contaminants such as trash and other non-recyclable items will not be emptied.鈥� Instead, residents will be given the opportunity to correct the mistake and return the cart to the curb the following week.鈥赌�听
鈥淚鈥檓 proud to once again bring the Recycle Right campaign to Akron in partnership with Keep Akron Beautiful,鈥� said Mayor Shammas Malik. 鈥淓ach year, this campaign helps educate our residents on what items belong in their recycling carts, and it鈥檚 helping us keep our program sustainable for our city and our environment.鈥�鈥�听Before the city began the Recycle Right campaign in 2019, the contamination rate of Akron’s recyclables was nearly 40%, which is high. It meant 40% of what residents were putting in their curbside recycling carts was not actually recyclable in Akron. This rate cost the city over $200,000 in contamination costs and put Akron鈥檚 entire recycling program in jeopardy.听听
That鈥檚 when the city implemented the Recycle Right campaign with Keep Akron Beautiful which had a significant impact. Then in 2023, Akron further improved recycling efforts by implementing a glass drop off program to allow residents to recycle glass in a way that wouldn鈥檛 contaminate the curbside recycling stream. In the first year of that program, at least 80 tons of glass were collected.鈥� Together, the Recycle Right campaign combined with the efforts of city sanitation employees and the glass drop-off program have transformed Akron鈥檚 recycling for the better. Last year, recycling audits confirmed the city鈥檚 contamination rate had fallen to about 12%. Now, instead of costing the city money, the recycling program creates revenue 鈥� more than $56,000 last year.听
鈥淭he cleaner our recycling stream, the more sustainable the program will be,鈥� said Keep Akron Beautiful CEO Jacqui Ricchiuti. 鈥淲e鈥檙e so excited by our low contamination rate and we want to keep the Recycle Right program as a shining example nationwide about how these types of educational campaigns can work to create real, sustainable change in communities like Akron.鈥�鈥赌�听