Record $917,436 To Towns for Recycling

Ocean County officials are paying taxpayers another dividend from an unlikely source, the county’s mutual fund of garbage.

“We haven’t missed a dividend payment since we’ve been in business,’’ said Freeholder James F. Lacey of the county’s recycling program that cashed in for a record sum during the first six months of the year.

They are sending a record $917,436 back to local governments based on the amount of items each town recycled. Barnegat's cut is $31,089.

More than 35,300 tons of what once was bound for dumps in the county were sent for reuse since January.

That is after the county took a share of the money to continue running the massive materials processing center in Lakewood that readies everything from broken bottles to aluminum for the market.

Recycling became the chief waste disposal strategy of county officials in the late 1980s, when voters rejected plans for a massive trash incinerator in Waretown about the time the state Department of Environmental Protection was closing but one of the landfills in the county.

The recycling effort is designed to prolong the life of that private dump, the Ocean County Landfill in Manchester Township, where local governments pay to dump their waste. The first six months of recycling this year cut the landfill tab to local governments by $2.5 million, according to Lacey.

Over the life of the recycling program, he said, the dumping fee savings are $95 million.

Changes in how materials are sold to recyclers meant more money, Lacey said. Buying a baler to compress paper and cardboard upped the per ton price being paid to the county for cardboard by $34 a ton, to $212.

Aluminum is bringing $1,453 per ton, newspapers $181 per ton, and tin cans $301 per ton.

“These were not the busiest months,’’ for recycling, he said of the period ending June 30.  The summer months produce more recyclables and if the market for them remains strong, could produce an even bigger dividend at the end of the year.

Checks are in the mail to communities for their recycling revenue sharing, he said.

Toms River will get one for $183,806, Lakewood $140,141, and Brick $100,222. Berkeley is in line for $48,109, Lacey for $48,077, Manchester for $39,362, Point Pleasant for $31,689, and Point Beach $11,854.

What's recyclable?

Barnegat has switched to "single stream" recycling, which means everything from aluminum cans to newspapers can go in one 32-gallon container for pickup on your alloted day (check out the township's public works page for the schedule).

Here's what can go in the can:

• Empty aerosol cans
• Aluminum
• Tin and steel cans
• Clear, green and brown glass
• Plastic beverage, detergent, shampoo and food containers with a neck narrower than the body – all of which must be rinsed
• Newspapers
• Corrugated cardboard
• Brown paper bags
• Mixed paper, including magazines, catalogs, color inserts, envelopes, junk mail, office paper, carbonless forms, pamphlets, brochures and advertisements