Curbside pickup of recyclables begins this month! Late last month town employees were busy distributing blue and yellow containers to households around the borough. While you may still bring your recyclables to the recycling center, many residents have asked us to provide the service of home pickups. In addition to being a much asked for service and being good for the environment, this also has the opportunity to save tax dollars for everyone.

Recyclable material which is wrongly placed in with household trash is very costly for the borough to dispose of. In fact, it is the law in New Jersey that recycling is mandatory. The state is getting tougher on its enforcement of this mandate and we must be attentive as well. The more recyclable material taken out of the trash and landfills and sent to appropriate recycling centers means less expense and more revenue for the borough.

On the first day of your scheduled trash pickups on the 1st and 3rd weeks

of each month, the borough will be picking up acceptable recyclables at the curb. Discussions have been held with various homeowners associations in town to help facilitate the best way to implement the program in each of the condominium complexes. Please check with your homeowners association to see how your development has chosen to comply with the state mandated recycling regulations. Household trash containers found with recyclable material inside will have a violation sticker placed on the outside and will not be picked up by the borough’s trash hauler.

For those who received the blue & yellow bins, or see the used garbage truck that was converted to pick up recyclables, I am pleased to let you know that these were able to be provided without adding to your taxes. These were funded through our participation in a recycling trust fund.

Many of your town officials and employees have worked very hard to bring this frequently asked for service to you. I would especially like to thank the efforts of Borough Administrator Sean Canning; DPW Superintendent Tom Piorkowski and Recycling Coordinator Kevin Mackey for not only making this program work but for finding a way to potentially make it a significant cost savings to the borough as well. I would also like to thank the Borough Council for supporting this environmentally & financially sound initiative.