It’s official, we have a winner. Kim Thompson was the first to correctly answer the “What’s wrong with this picture” question in the last column, and I have to admit it was a difficult quiz. The photo wasn’t all that great, it was small, hard to see, and black and white.
Some folks thought that the brown plastic jug in the photo was glass, someone thought they saw a diaper in the mix, someone else mistook a jar for being glass. Kim correctly identified covers on the containers, number two plastics mixed in with the “all other plastics” and other items she identified. A cash award of $10 awaits Kim. It’s not a ton of money but just an experiment to see how many people are paying attention to the recycling issue.
I was pleasantly surprised to receive dozens of responses to the question, many as early at 6 a.m., emails, texts and phone calls, and I want to thank you all for playing.
The purpose of the recycle committee is to encourage the greater Houlton area to get on board with the recycling effort. Did you know that Houlton falls extremely short of the state goal for percentage of recycling? Nobody’s fault, Houlton isn’t the armpit of the recycling world, don’t let anybody tell you that we are, but up until recently we had limited ability to recycle anything but heavy corrugated cardboard, glass, tin and number two plastics. The addition of the “all other” plastics bin was huge and I know that people will really begin to practice this environmentally friendly act of rinsing and tossing, and keeping these items out of our landfills.
Speaking of items that can be recycled, just a reminder that all your beauty containers can be taken to the electronics department at Walmart. Cara Maples mails those in for cash that is donated to local animal shelters, a wonderful way to turn trash into cash. Also, your used toner cartridges can be dropped off at 76 North St. (Varney Agency office) and Wendy Henderson will mail those in for cash that is shared by the Ark Animal Sanctuary and Houlton Humane Society. If you work in an office that accumulates large amounts of used cartridges, consider dropping them off.
As adults there is much we can do, but our biggest goal is to educate our children so we are bringing up a whole new generation of environmentally aware young people. Recently the second grade classes of Ms. Kirk, Ms. Fitzpatrick, Mrs. Lilley, Ms. K. Fitzpatrick and Mrs. L. Fitzpatrick participated in the first ever poster contest. Winners were announced as follows, Colby Scott, Leah Marie Swallow, Karyssa Kenney, Kaitlynn Ramsey and Keegan Brown.
Their art is currently on display at the Casella offices on Florence Avenue, as well as the rest of the class art which will be rotated throughout the building for your viewing pleasure. It takes just a minute to run through the transfer station to drop off your recyclables, if you’ve never been, now is a great time to just visit, check out the art, get to know the flow of the operation and the lay of the land, and plan your first trip with your first bag of clean glass, tin cans or plastics. You’ll feel really good about yourself the more you get into it, and the earth, and generations to come, will benefit.
Have a great week.
