Texas city launches recycling education campaign

The city of Fort Worth, Texas, has launched a campaign to educate residents on items they should and should not recycle.

According to a news release from the city’s government website, the campaign titled WAIT—which is an acronym for “Where am I tossing?”—is meant to encourage residents to pause before they throw items in the wrong cart.

“Almost 30 percent of material that goes to our local recycling processing facility is contaminated,” says Christian Harper, contract services administrator in Fort Worth’s Code Compliance Department’s Solid Waste Services Division. “And most people don’t know that nonrecyclable items tossed in your blue recycle cart cost the city and residents five times more to process than if those items had been tossed in the brown cart. Our goal is to engage residents in recycling right. Once that happens, we hope to see residents recycling more of the correct things.”

The city offers a Waste Wizard landing page and the Fort Worth Garbage and Recycling app on the Apple App Store and Google Play to help residents determine what is and isn’t recyclable.