All glass bottles and jars can be recycled.  Glass containers should be emptied and rinsed or wiped clean of food residue, with the lid placed back on the jar.  Paper labels can remain on containers. 

Please note that other types of household glass such as candle jars, vases, drinking glasses, or picture frame glass can not be recycled in our program. 

All metal food and beverage cans can be recycled, along with aluminum foil and disposable aluminum pans.  Items should be emptied and rinsed or wiped clean of food residue.  Metal lids can be placed inside cans with the can gently crimped to keep the lid inside.  Paper labels can remain on cans.  

Forget what you learned about the recycling triangles (and plastic resin codes), and focus on the shape of the container! Plastic containers that are in the shape of  bottles, jars, jugs or tubs can be recycled.  All items should be emptied and rinsed or wiped clean of food residue, and the lid should be put back on the container. 

Please note that black plastic containers should go in the trash.  Plastic is sorted in the recycling facility with an optical scanner, which cannot distinguish black plastic.

Paper that is clean and dry, with no food or liquid contact, is accepted for recycling.  This includes newspaper, magazines, paper bags, copy paper, office documents, folders, envelopes, food boxes (e.g., cereal, cracker, and snack boxes) and soft-covered books.  Paper clips and staples are OK, but no spiral notebook binders or file folders with metal hangers.  Envelopes with plastic windows are OK, but no plastic or padded shipping envelopes.  No hard-covered books, unless the cover is ripped off and thrown away, and no three-ring binders. 

Please note that paper plates, paper cups, napkins, paper towels or tissues are not recyclable. 

Cardboard boxes, cardboard tubes (e.g., from paper towel rolls), and pizza boxes are all accepted with cardboard recycling.  Cardboard boxes should be emptied and flattened with all packing materials removed.  Pizza boxes should be completely empty with no food, napkins, condiment packets, or plastic pizza savers. Small amounts of grease and cheese residual is OK.

Residual food and liquid contaminate other recyclable materials, and can send an entire container of otherwise suitable recyclables to the trash.  Please empty all liquids out of containers (including ice), and rinse or wipe away all food residue. 

This includes plastic or padded shipping envelopes, bubble wrap, and wrappings around cases of water bottles or other packages).  Plastic bags and film are the most common and most problematic contaminant in recycling.  The plastic gets tangled around recycling machinery and needs to be manually cut out of the equipment, posing a risk to workers and slowing down the recycling process.  If you collect your recycling in a plastic bag, please empty all items out of the bag and into the collection bin.  Plastic bags can be returned to many grocery and retail stores for recycling, or should be put in the trash.

Styrofoam requires special handling to be recycled, and is not collected as part of our regular recycling program.  Please keep all Styrofoam out of the recycling bins.  This includes Styrofoam packaging, coolers, packing peanuts, and other types of foam.  Styrofoam should be thrown in the trash or saved for specialty collection events that occasionally occur in the community.  Did you know – if you leave Styrofoam packaging inside a box, the entire box gets trashed at the recycling facility (including the valuable cardboard).

Drink cartons like the ones used for almond milk or aseptic packaging like used for shelf-stable broths contain multiple layers of materials, including fiber, plastic, and sometimes aluminum, and require special processing equipment to separate the layers and recover the fiber for recycling.  There are currently only three paper mills in the U.S. that can process cartons (IA, MI and WI), and our regional recycling facilities cannot cost-effectively recover and ship these cartons for recycling.  Please put all drink cartons into the trash.