Contributed by Randi Perlman
As summer approaches, it’s fun to spend time in the park. Have you ever visited Alaska’s ONLY state-of-the-art Resource Recovery & Training Park? Officially called Valley Community for Recycling Solutions (VCRS), your local recycling center is a bustling operation where you can drop off clean & sorted recyclables, pick up re-use items you may need at a very reasonable price, shop in our Rescued Books Store, and bring your children into the classroom to look through our ‘window on the [recycling] world’ down to the processing floor below where they can watch heavy equipment operators bale all those sorted materials, which are then sold as individual commodities, shipped all across the U.S.A., and re-manufactured into products with a new life – a true example of Reduce, Reuse, Recycle.
Residents from around the Valley and beyond have become regular customers, and enjoy purchasing one or more of the many types of re-use items supplied by the center. They find items they’re looking for, and their purchase helps support various recycling programs. VCRS supplies 12 different re-use materials for sale, at prices that simply can’t be beat! These include:
Shredded office paper
Bubble wrap (bags of assorted wrap)
Packing peanuts (cornstarch & Styrofoam)
Books (all genres, for all age groups, in the Rescued Books Store)
Kitty Litter buckets, and sometimes 5-gallon buckets
Plastic milk jugs (used by gardeners to create miniature greenhouses)
Plastic soda bottles, 2 litre or other sizes (used by teachers for school projects like building rockets, terrariums, or other creations)
Egg cartons (12 & 18 pack paper ones only)
Cardboard boxes (for moving or storage)
Bundles of newspaper (for packing, lining, burning)
Compost (once it’s ready; not necessarily every summer)
It’s always good to call ahead and make sure the re-use items you’re looking for are ‘in stock’. Cardboard boxes and egg cartons are almost always available, and the shelves of the Rescued Books Store are usually well stocked with great reading choices for all ages. For some of the other listed items, supplies come and go, so they are not always on hand. Sometimes they need to be gathered (milk jugs, two litre or other size soda bottles), and sometimes they cannot be gathered; it all depends on what has been dropped off by community members, which is constantly changing.
Some items, like bubble wrap and both kinds of packing peanuts, have been in high demand at VCRS since the early days, and are regularly requested. Bubble wrap is accepted for recycling in the Plastic Bags & Film category, as long as it’s free of excess tape. BUT, bubble wrap in GOOD condition (not torn or mangled when it’s wrapped around some odd-shaped item for mailing or moving) should be kept separate so it can be made available for re-use. Both packing peanuts and bubble wrap are provided in 30 gallon bags for purchase at $2 a bag – now, that’s a steal of a deal! NO block or sheet-style Styrofoam is accepted for recycling or re-use.
Visit our website at www.valleyrecycling.org, or call your friendly Resource Recovery & Training Park at 907-745-5544 with any questions or to check on availability of re-use materials. Remember, try to REDUCE the amount you use, REUSE things when you can, and then RECYCLE… Keep it from becoming trash – Don’t Feed the Landfills – Make it a Habit!
Together We Are Turning it Around!
Pick up next month’s edition of The People’s Paper/Make a Scene Magazine for Recycling Repeats Itself, Episode 7