Food scraps drop-off sites to open soon in the Centre Region. Here’s what to know

This month instead of talking about recycling traditional materials like bottles and cans, I am going to talk about recycling the greatest amount of a material in your trash: food waste. Approximately 40% of what goes to landfills is organic material (food waste, yard waste, soiled paper products, etc.) Removing organic material from our landfills can go a long way in preserving the life of a landfill.

To help reduce organic material going to the Laurel Highlands Landfill (the landfill where Centre County’s trash is disposed), the Centre Region Council of Governments, the Centre County Recycling and Refuse Authority and the Borough of State College are hosting a pilot program for more sustainable management of our kitchen waste. They have established five food scraps drop-off locations to accept this material.

These food scraps drop off sites will be available to residents who sign up (for free) to compost their food scraps rather than sending for disposal. This organic waste is a nutrient-rich source for our local compost facility, and eventually becomes a valuable soil amendment.

If you would like to participate in this free pilot program, you must register first. Visit www.crcog.net/refuse to fill out a short form. Once registered, you will receive a list of the drop-off locations along with the lock combination for the sites.

Next, collect your food scraps. A list will be sent to you detailing what to include and what to leave out, as well as tips on how to collect these materials while limiting smells and bugs.

The last step is to bring your material to one of the designated locations: the sites are locked, but with your combination you will be able to use any site any day. For your safety, we ask that you access the sites during daylight hours only.

We suggest you add the last step to errands you are already running or a stop along the way in your day as not to make a separate trip to drop off your material.

The five pilot sites are located in the townships of Benner, College, Ferguson, Harris and Patton and will remain open through October. Once the pilot program ends, we will collect data on the number of participants and tonnage of food scraps diverted from the landfill to gauge potential impacts of establishing permanent drop-off sites in the future.

We know that residents in the Centre Region have been asking for this program or one like it for many years now and hope this is something that can continue to grow. Many areas around the country have organics drop-off programs like this and have proven wildly popular and highly successful.

This pilot program kicks off on June 19, so register today to receive all of the information you need to help eliminate some organic matter from landfill disposal while helping to supply our county with nutrient-rich compost for our residents.

Thank you for your participation. For more information, visit www.crcog.net/refuse or call 814-234-7198.