In the coming months, Frederick County Executive Jan Gardner will develop our next long-term solid waste strategy through a facilitated public process in which you are invited to participate.
 
"I'm excited to be kicking off this public outreach process," County Executive Gardner said. "We want you to be engaged. Share your ideas about possible next steps for Frederick County. Come to one of our community brainstorming sessions to be heard."

"Together we will actively examine all the ideas and alternatives available to us, such as resource recovery, composting, anaerobic digestion, zero waste initiatives and other options.  My objective is to have an open, transparent, impartial process that balances diverse ideas and perspectives."

A series of "What's Next?" Solid Waste Public Forums will be held, led by a professional facilitator, to provide residents with neutral environments to discuss ideas. Each forum will begin with a brief presentation on the County's current solid waste management status. Then the work of brainstorming begins, with a majority of time at each session designed to solicit maximum participation from and dialogue with the citizens who attend.

The workshops are scheduled for the following dates and locations; please check the steering committee's website or call 301-600-2960 for more information:

• Monday, November 9,  7pm, Winchester Hall, 12 East Church Street, Frederick
• Thursday, November 19,  7pm, Oakdale High School, 5950 Eaglehead Dr., Ijamsville
• Monday, December 7, 7pm, Brunswick Fire Company,1500 Volunteer Drive, Brunswick
• Monday, January 11, 7pm, Urbana High School, 3471 Campus Dr., Ijamsville
• Saturday, January 23, 10am, Thurmont Town Hall, 615 East Main Street, Thurmont

Solid waste management issues impact every resident, business and organization in Frederick County. We encourage you to participate and help shape our path forward.

For more information, please visit www.FrederickCountyMD.gov/WhatsNext.

You place paper, cardboard and empty glass, metal and plastic containers into a recycling cart or bin. (Note the word containers. Our curbside collection and sorting process is not designed to handle scrap metal, textiles, electronics, large plastics items like patio chairs, or other non-traditional recyclable items. Many of these types of materials have special drop-off programs in place to properly process them.) We collect acceptable recyclable items at the curb, transfer them onto a tractor-trailer and then send them off to a materials recovery facility, or MRF (say "murf" to sound in-the-know) to be sorted.

At the MRF, a fascinating combination of machine technology and human labor separates all the different types of materials, picks out items that don't belong, and bundles the sorted recyclables into bales. These large, rectangular bales of paper, plastics or metals are made available to manufacturers. They are sold and once again loaded onto trucks and shipped off to their new destinies. Old becomes new, resources are conserved, and the cycle starts all over again.
So, if you wishfully place that plastic cup or takeout container in your recycle bin, at best you've just sent it on a roundabout journey to finally be disposed (which reduces the efficiency of Frederick County's waste management operations); it's not the end of the world, but, a rather unnecessary detour, don't you think?  At worst, if enough non-recyclable plastics contaminate the materials collected, it can render an entire load un-recyclable. So, to help our program function at its best, please recycle right and review the list of what can and cannot be collected in our carts and bins.

Thank you for doing your part!

 

"Styrofoam" That's spelled out in quotes because, well, what you likely call "styrofoam" isn't even really Styrofoam™ (which is actually a trademarked brand of closed-cell extruded polystyrene foam primarily used for thermal insulation). But you know what we're talking about, and it isn't collected for recycling- not in the form of coffee cups, packing peanuts, picnic coolers or any other expanded polystyrene product. Sorry.

 

Thin brittle plastics. This includes takeout, deli and produce containers as well as the ubiquitous disposable party cups (red or any other color), restaurant soda cups, etc.

 

Trash bags. White, black, clear, scented, draw-string, stretchy, whatever. NO trash bags are recyclable and, what's worse, placing recyclable materials inside a trash bag can doom them to being disposed as waste at the MRF.

 

Mystery Plastics. Ball point pens. 3-ring binders. That impossible-to-open plastic case sealed around the new gadget you just bought. While having a resin ID code doesn't guarantee an item's recyclability, not having one at all makes it very difficult to sort. Remember, when in doubt, throw it out.