By Joe Scavuzzo, Director, Department of Public Works

The Camden County Division of Environmental Affairs has embarked on a new initiative to expand the recycling efforts of all towns of Camden County. Pennsauken Township has already begun outreach initiatives to businesses and is looking to expand to religious institutions, schools, and our residents.

Each year, an annual “recycling tonnage report” is compiled by Anthony Feriozzi, the Township’s recycling coordinator and the Public Works Department superintendent. Waste Management, the town’s Trash collection contractor, provides the tonnage for all of the recyclables picked up from all over town each week from Pennsauken’s various neighborhoods. This also includes any “white goods,” metal products such as appliances, filing cabinets and scrap metal, as well as yard debris picked up on Wednesdays.

A fair amount of businesses, such as those in our expansive industrial parks, have private recycling collection performed by various contractors and report these figures in to the Public Works office for the annual report.

The first phase of this new initiative is to identify those businesses that do not report these figures annually. There is no cost involved, just a simple e-mail or phone call, passing-along the end-of-year tonnage for a particular business or group of businesses with shared recycling collection.

Why the new initiative? Expanding the recycling efforts in Pennsauken will undoubtedly have a positive impact on the environment. I’ve noticed that my recyclables outweigh my trash on occasion from junk mail and my wife’s drinking habits… this is just a joke; writing an interesting article about recycling is not easy! We’ll see if she still reads this column…

The bottom line: yep, that’s right, it comes down to money. Each year, as a result of the Township’s recycling tonnage report, Pennsauken receives a recycling grant dollar amount. These funds are used to purchase recycling buckets for new residents, expand those that are expanding their recycling efforts, and even for new recycling initiatives around town.

It’s a win-win. An increased amount of businesses reporting each year will increase Pennsauken’s annual tonnage amount and will subsequently increase the following year’s grant amount. That means we can double-down on more efforts via recycling education, expansion of existing programs and get that grant amount even higher! Remember, this grant offsets the need to have our Municipal taxes cover these initiatives.

As a related aside, Pennsauken residents are all too familiar with the bright yellow recycling buckets that the Township hands out. If yours is broken, stop by our complex at 6725 Wayne Ave.; the main gate is on Clement Ave. across from Wawa. Rachael will be glad to assist you. Please bring your damaged one so that we can…you guessed it…recycle it!

I thank all of you for hanging along for this article, as I know it is a bit dry. Keep a look out for the start of the leaf collection season, formally beginning after Nov. 7. We will be posting our weekend routes on both the Township and All Around Pennsauken’s Facebook accounts.

On behalf of the staff of Pennsauken’s Department of Public Works, I would like to wish you and yours a Happy Thanksgiving! And as always, if you have any questions or concerns, please reach us at (856) 663-0178 or publicworks@twp.pennsauken.nj.us.