If Christmas and Ḥanukkah have left you with a pile of cardboard boxes and wrapping paper, you can give a gift to the environment by recycling them instead of putting them out with the garbage.
“When you bring cardboard and wrapping paper to the Verona Recycling Center, recyclers will pay Verona to turn them into other paper products,” says Gloria Machnowski, the chair of the Verona Environmental Commission. “When you put them into the garbage, we have to pay for them to be taken away.” Cardboard doesn’t compress well in garbage trucks, so our haulers can’t pick up as much trash per truck. But we still pay the same disposal fee, whether the truck is full or not.
What about all those annoying packing peanuts? Scott Harrington, the owner of the PostNet store at 281Â Bloomfield Avenue, has let us know that he will recycle them for you.
And if your household got an electronic gift that replaced an older piece of electronics gear, you should bring that to the Verona Recycling Center instead of putting it in the trash. Electronics like cell phones and computers can contain several highly polluting metals.
And of course, when the time comes to take down your Christmas tree, it too can be recycled. Simply place it at the curb–without the plastic bag you used to carry it outside–and Verona’s Department of Public Works will do the rest.
For more information on recycling, see the Web site of the Verona Environmental Commission.
