Montgomery County’s recycling rate reached an all-time high of 43.2 percent, with residents and businesses recycling a record total of 528,187 tons of waste in the past fiscal year.
Between July 2006 and July 2007, county residents recycled 8,000 more tons of waste than in the previous 12 months. Washingtonian Magazine awarded Montgomery County top honors in a “Who Does Best at Recycling?” evaluation of 13 local jurisdictions.
Eileen Kao, the county’s recycling section chief, said she was pleased but not surprised.
“People have responded,” Kao said. “I see day in and day out that people in the county are recycling more than ever. At the same time, I am glad to have data to prove it.”
Kao said it was tough to pinpoint one particular program that was responsible for the increase but that commercial recycling showed the largest rate of improvements. According to Kao, the county has tried to encourage coordination among smaller businesses that often struggle with having enough manpower and profit margin to coordinate comprehensive recycling efforts.
“We have initiatives under way to assist them in cooperative collection projects now,” Kao said. “We try to help them work together, pull resources together — both staff and economic, and pull refuse and recyclables together to share costs of services and collection containers, which really does make it cheaper and easier for these businesses.”
The county is also unveiling a new TV recycling program, in which residents may bring their old sets at no charge to the Shady Grove Processing Facility and Transfer Station located at 16101 Frederick Road in Derwood. The effort is designed to coincide with the upcoming changeover in TV technology coming in early 2009.
