Curbside recycling pickup is ending in Clay County later this year. | Randy Roguski, WJCT News 89.9
Published on December 29, 2023 at 1:37 pm
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Clay County is tightening up the way you recycle.
The county wants residents to focus on recycling what officials call high-value items. Those items include cardboard boxes no larger than 3 by 3 feet, plastic containers with a No. 1 or No. 2 indicator and metal cans. The county will no longer recycle pizza and cereal boxes, paper, packaging and wrapping, glass and plastic bags.
The change applies to all county residents except for people living in Orange Park.
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The changes are necessary, the county says, to keep the recycling program in Clay County viable and to prevent any cost increases for residents.
The county’s environmental services manager, Milton Towns, said the county is adapting to changing markets by focusing on recyclables with value.
“This change is in part trying to protect our recycling program, continue to recycle the things that make sense financially to recycle, and let the other things like glass go,” Towns said.
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Glass breaks and contaminates other items during the recycling process, Towns said.
Items that used to be recycled should now be thrown away with your regular trash. The motto is: “When in doubt, throw it out.”
The economics of recycling in Clay break down like this: The county previously received $6 per ton for recyclable materials, but Towns said the county started to pay $85 per ton to have materials recycled beginning in October 2023. The payments were required under the county’s agreement with its recycling company, WM, formerly known as Waste Management.
The county says the increase comes out to $232,489 annually for recycling. Recycling in the county is paid through the solid waste fund, which is set up to be self-sustaining so any increase in costs needs to be passed on to residents.
If that happened, Towns said, people could see an increase of about $8 per residence to pay for processing recyclables.
The county said that if people recycle only high-value items moving forward, then the program will continue with no additional costs for residents. Instead, the county will receive an estimated $15 a ton from its recycling processor.
To see if the changes are paying off, the recycling processor will begin taking audits of the materials that are collected every month and provide a breakdown to the county. After six months of audits, county commissioners will receive a report from staff to discuss what additional steps are needed for the recycling program.
Northeast Florida is not alone with recycling concerns. At the beginning of October, the city of Pensacola got rid of its recycling program due to rising costs and environmental concerns. Next October, Polk County will get rid of recycling in unincorporated areas of the county.
Clay County residents won’t be fined if they don’t recycle the proper materials, but they do run the risk of not getting their boxes, plastics and metal cans picked up, Towns said.
Starting next week, mailers will be sent to let people know about the change. If residents don’t recycle the correct materials after 60 to 90 days, then WM will leave a tag for residents reminding them of the change. If no changes happen after that, the recycling processor will not pick up your recycling.
Towns said he hopes the process doesn’t get to that point.
“That’s our hope is that we can do this through public education and voluntary compliance with the changes, and that way we can stay away from the tagging and the enforcement,” Towns said.
If you questions about the changes, you can email askclay@claycountygov.com.
Lead image: Clay County is going to get more strict about recycling. | Randy Roguski, WJCT News 89.9
