PLANO (WBAP & KLIF News) — Citizens of Plano are able to begin recycling again, two weeks after a fire destroyed the city’s recycling plant.
Since December 29, the City of Plano has been sending recycling trucks to pick up residents’ recycling, but the contents had been taken to a landfill while they figured out a temporary location to serve as a drop-off point until the permanent recycling center is functional again.
As of Tuesday, January 10, a temporary location has been agreed upon.
“By resuming this program as quickly as possible, we can start the recycling processing again and keep those recyclables out of the landfill, which is the whole point” said Steve Stoler of the City of Plano.
Plano picks up recycling once every two weeks, so Stoler says most residents only had two cycles of recycling taken to the landfill. And because of the fire occurring around the holidays, he says in total recycling was taken to a landfill for only five or six days.
“We’re ecstatic about resuming the program,” Stoler said. “We were not happy about putting anything additional in the landfill, because it defeats the purpose of recycling.”
City officials weren’t the only unhappy ones. Many residents had to either hold onto recyclable items a little longer than usual, which for some piled up because of holiday festivities. Some even took their recyclables to surrounding cities, except for Richardson, who with Plano shared the same recycling plant that caught fire in late December.
Stoler said during the last two years, the city has averaged 18,500 tons of recyclables, which comes out to about 90 tons a day.
“There’s been a lot of disappointment because people want to recycle,” Stoler said. “Obviously with 90 tons a day, that’s a lot of people and a lot of items. What we told people from the start is that we wanted to get the situations taken care of as quickly as possible.”
