Holidays bring good cheer, new stuff and mounds of trash. The City of Leitchfield had an extra crew helping with recycling the week after Christmas. The city truck pulled a trailer with four large cardboard boxes on it through Leitchfield, assisting the two regular recycling trucks. Henry Eastridge, a city employee, said trash pickup during and after the holidays is usually “pretty heavy.”

Both residential and business recycling increases between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day. The city normally sends out 37 tons of recycled materials, said Sheila Puckett with Leitchfield Public Works. However, in January, when the Christmas recycling is sent out, the city is removing more than 57 tons of cardboard, glass and newspapers.

Leitchfield’s curb-side service accepts glass bottles and jars, newspapers, magazines, aluminum and steel food or beverage cans, plastic bottles and jugs and paper products such as envelopes, cardboard, phone books and computer paper. The city service requests that lids are removed from plastic containers and it doesn’t accept aerosol cans mirrors, light bulbs, ceramics or anything that has stored paint or hazardous materials.

Cardboard is the most commonly recycled item, Eastridge said. The city sends two semi-loads of cardboard to Bluegrass Regional Recycling in Richmond each month for recycling, while only load of all other recycled items are sent, said Puckett.

“I know when businesses are having a sale,” Eastridge said with a smile. The cardboard boxes that are left out with the trash increases when sales are in progress. Tuesdays and Wednesdays are the busiest for the routes each week, he said.

The recycling program is strictly a service-oriented business for the city, said Puckett. It will never make enough money to even out the expenses. The City of Leitchfield sends more than 450 tons of recyclable trash to Richmond each year, which earns the city roughly $52,000 a year. The earnings don’t even cover payroll for the three full-time employees and one part-time employee, and certainly not the added expenses of gasoline, vehicles, materials and the building’s utility costs. However, sending the trash to recycle reduces the amount of trash sent to the landfill.

The city has received support for the program through Boy Scout and Girl Scout programs, said Puckett. The city also offers an educational program about recycling to area schools. For information about the program or to request a speaker about recycling, call 259-4034.

For more information about the recycling program, call 259-6385 or 259-4034.

Reprinted with permission from The Record, 209 West White Oak St., Leitchfield, Kentucky.