The City of Broken Arrow鈥檚 Solid Waste and Recycling program has hit a milestone and is now providing refuse services to 40,000 customers. Earlier in 2025, Broken Arrow was recognized in U.S. News and World Report as being the 12th best city to live and the #1 city in Oklahoma. This recognition underscores why Broken Arrow is one of the fastest growing cities in the country, and why our operations to provide the essential service of curbside collection for BA residents must consistently evolve to meet their needs.
The road to an efficient Solid Waste and Recycling program has not been a straight one. And it certainly didn鈥檛 come easy. In 2019, City leadership began looking at ways to improve its refuse services by adding recycling to the curbside collection programming. Back then, customers placed their bagged garbage and basically anything else they wanted to dispose of at the curb. We provided twice-a-week collection services. It was backbreaking work, and the operational expenses were beginning to mount for this type of service. The City hired a consultant and held multiple public meetings to discuss opportunities for service changes, including adding a cart service and curbside recycling.
In 2020, with the support of the public and City Council, the new cart system was rolled out and the process of converting the system began. Customers began using a black 96-gallon cart for their trash and a blue 96-gallon for their recyclables. This new, more sustainable approach to curbside collections, allowed us to scale our operations back to once-a-week service.
The excitement of the new system and customer adoption was unfortunately derailed when the regional recycling facility the City used to offload recyclables caught fire in 2021, causing millions of dollars in damage. However, this would not deter the City鈥檚 team. With the help of the Broken Arow Municipal Authority, Assistant City Manager of Operations, and City Manager, we were provided the support we needed to move the programming forward. The Solid Waste and Recycling Department used the recycling facility down time to reinvent our service expectations.
We teamed up with our partners at the Metropolitan Environmental Trust (MET) and Keep Broken Arrow Beautiful to create a Trash Bash and Recycle Rally event. The Trash Bash focused on engaging volunteers to help pick up litter from roadways and streams. The Recycle Rally was a drop-off event that enabled citizens to dispose of hard-to-recycle items. The MET processed those items to keep them out of the landfill.
Meanwhile, with the support and authorization of the City Councilmembers in their role as trustees of the Municipal Authority, the City purchased additional Automated Side Load Vehicles to enhance our collection services.聽 These vehicles have been a game changer! Not only have we become more efficient in our collections, but we鈥檙e also seeing fewer workplace injuries, and employee recruitment and retention is improving!
In 2022, the recycling facility was repaired and came back online. Today, Broken Arrow continues to boom with nearly 123,000 residents, an award-winning downtown, innovation and industry expansion, and yes, recycling! Broken Arrow is redefining what service for a municipality looks like. The hard work of the men and women of the Solid Waste and Recycling Department continues to showcase what great service looks like. And we can鈥檛 wait to see what types of exciting changes are next!