Last Chance To “E-Rase Your E-Waste” For 2011

After collecting 46,062 lbs. of e-waste during its first four summer mini events, the area “E-rase your E-waste” e-cycling team is ready to close out the season with a record-setting bang at their annual weekend collection Friday and Saturday in Sidney.

“That beats our second highest annual total and is only 1,000 lbs. below what we collected all of last year, which was our best year yet,” Butch Renders, a member of the organizing team, said of the collections to date. “We’ll easily break the record with our weekend event, which is when we typically get the biggest collection for the year. It’s a convenient time for those doing fall cleaning, clearing out their basements and garages.”

That weekend event is FREE and is set for this Friday and Saturday beginning at 8 a.m. both days and running until 6 p.m. on Friday and 1 p.m. on Saturday. The weekend collection is being held at the Richland County Shop, 2140 W. Holly, Sidney, next to the fairgrounds. Signs will be posted. UNICOR is again the e-cycler.

Renders and “E-rase your E-waste” Committee Co-chairs Jackie Couture and Cindy Eleson encourage anyone interested to participate this weekend. “This is your last chance for 2011,” Couture noted. “So if you have any old electronic items you want to get rid of bring them on down Friday and Saturday and we’ll make sure they’re recycled properly so they won’t contribute to any potential environmental or human health hazards.”

Local Support

Appreciated

This is the seventh year the group has been providing e-waste recycling events in the region, and organizers note they couldn’t do it without the help of many organizations, businesses and individuals. In the past, several groups have provided funding for the event and to offset costs to participants when there was a recycling charge, Renders said, including Sidney Health Center, the city and county and others. Now that the event is free, several of those same businesses and others have been helping provide pallets, cardboard, gaylords and shrink wrap for packaging to aid the effort, Renders said. This year, those contributors include Sidney Health Center, Sidney Sugars, and Anchor Drilling, Sidney and National Varco Oilwell and NAPA Auto Parts, Williston.

“And, of course, the county lets us use their shop and equipment for the event and to store all the e-waste collected until UNICOR can come and get it, which we really appreciate,” Renders said. In addition, the Montana Department of Environmental Quality has provided additional funding annually for use in promoting the event, Couture noted.

Volunteers Welcome!

And then there are the volunteers. “We really want to thank the RSVP program again for helping line up volunteers for this event,” Couture said, “and this year we also want to thank the Sidney High School Key Club for their help at several of the summer collection events. We couldn’t have done it without them.”

The group has also had help in the past from Sidney High School students in Caryn Fehilly’s web design class, Couture said, adding that two students in the class may also be available to help with this year’s weekend event. “We definitely appreciate their interest and, of course, welcome their assistance,” she said.

But while help has been plentiful to date, both Couture and Renders noted that there’s definitely room for more during the big weekend event. They encouraged anyone interested in helping out, even for just a couple hours, to contact Couture at 406-433-9422.

For those interested in more details on the event and acceptable items for e-cyling, help is available at http://www.ars.usda.gov/npa/nparl/ewaste. Businesses, schools and other organizations with large amounts of e-waste to recycle are asked to make an appointment to drop off their items by again calling Jackie Couture at 406-433-9422. Please leave a message.

The E-rase your E-waste effort in Sidney is coordinated by members of the Richland County Local Emergency Planning Committee (LEPC), Richland Opportunities Inc., the USDA-ARS Northern Plains Agricultural Research Laboratory and volunteers with several other community businesses and organizations.