Important Notice from the Board of Health

New Recycle Guidelines
picture showing no cartons allowed
 From the desk of the Board of Health Agent   8-29-2018: 

I wish to take this opportunity to thank all Fairhaven residents who have taken the time to understand the new recycle cart program. Recycling was adopted by Fairhaven as a by-law in 1991 and mandates the recycling program apply to all residences, schools and municipal facilities. This is not a program created by Fairhaven. This is a state wide DEP Recycle program. The official launch of the clean-up of our recycling program was introduced by the Lieutenant Governor Karyn Polito on August 20, 2018. Our information and promotional materials are provided and approved through Mass DEP. These are the new Massachusetts guidelines the entire state will be following. We produced a public service announcement which will hopefully clear up any confusion. It is on our Board of Health page on the Town website, along with Facebook and YouTube. I tried to be very informative. Follow this link to watch the video: https://youtu.be/ZGAMZJ8SGW4

I am sorry for any confusion; the entire recycle program has changed along with the world recycling market. My best advice is to abandon any previous information you may have had in the past. The symbols are incorrect and misleading. The message has been simplified.  The only items allowed in the orange covered recycle bin are clean and dry; bottles, jugs, jars, cans, paper, plastic and cardboard (flattened boxes). They are the categories listed in the flyer we sent out and on the other side of this notice. There are other venues for other types of recycling. There are many items that could be recycled, just not in the curbside bin. I could meet with you to guide you through the new recycle process if you still have questions or you could ask a member of the recycle team or visit https://recyclesmartma.org/

One cart with contamination or waste could cause the entire truck to be sent to the landfill. Ten or more tractor trailer loads are turned away at the MRF every day for that reason. The MRF is going to pass that cost on to the towns.

Fairhaven's recycle contract is going to expire next year. We will be charged based on the quality (only allowable recyclable items in the cart) along with the contamination rate (number of plastic, tanglers, food waste, grass clippings, etc.) of our recycling if we don't clean up our recyclables then our fees have the potential of doubling or tripling which would mean tax increases or even worse Town meeting will not fund curbside pickup due to the cost increase and each person would have to bring their items to a drop off center.

Always a pleasure, Mary Freire-KelloggHealth Agent