(831) 420-5160www.cityofsantacruz.com

❝ ❞Page 4 Fall 2015

Fall 2015

We want your suggestions,questions and comments!

Public Works Department809 Center Street, Room 201

Santa Cruz, CA 95060831-420-5160

www.cityofsantacruz.com

The Santa Cruz Public Works Department provides the City of Santa Cruz with a variety of services including engineering design, traffic engineering and maintenance, storm water management, street maintenance, resource recovery management, wastewater management, flood control and parking control. The Public Works Department is committed to bringing the Santa Cruz community the highest possible quality of life.

Funded by City of Santa Cruz Public WorksCopyright© 2015

City of Santa Cruz Public Works and Eco Partners, Inc.All rights reserved.

PrinTeD on 100% reCyCleD PaPer WiTh 70% PoST-ConSumer neWS ConTenT, uSing

Soy inkS

What Is Extended Producer Responsibility?our City of Santa Cruz is unique in so many ways, from its natural beauty to the diverse people who call it home. Santa Cruz is also unique in how it manages waste. We haul trash and recycling with our own fleet of hybrid trucks and a staff of solid waste workers, whereas many other municipalities use outside contractors. The City operates its own resource recovery Facility, which includes both a recycling center and a landfill.

Santa Cruz is a great little beach town where life is simple, but trash is not as simple as it once was. It has become more and more complicated over the years. During the 1920s when our City landfill opened, garbage was fairly uncomplicated, consisting of only 10% man-made materials. Today, most of our waste consists of manufactured products and packaging. We have electronic devices that quickly become obsolete and are discarded for newer models. more and more products and their packaging are designed for a single use with convenience weighted over environmental consequences. Packaging has become a multi-layer and multi-material affair with cardboard, metal and different grades of plastic in a single container or package. All of these new products and packages have to go somewhere at the end of their useful life. Currently, it is local government that has to figure out how to deal with all of the resulting waste, while the maker of the product and packaging has no responsibility whatsoever once the product leaves their factory gates.

So, along comes the concept of Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR). The term has been a part of the solid waste management language for many years. It was first introduced in Sweden in 1990. So what is it and why do local and state governments support the idea?

in short, extended Producer responsibility refers to a mandatory type of product stewardship. Instead of local government carrying the sole burden of disposal costs, ePr places the primary responsibility on the producer or the brand owner of a product. Most producer responsibility laws target products that contain hazardous materials or products that are difficult and costly to deal with when they are discarded.

There are currently four ePr laws in California (see box). These laws put the disposal responsibility back on the producer. The maker of a product has the greatest ability to implement changes in product and package design to minimize the negative impacts that their products have on human health and the environment. EPR laws encourage companies to do just that.

Some innovative and proactive companies are taking responsibility for their products by designing them with sustainable materials and end-of-use disposal in mind. Yet in many cases, companies will do nothing to accept responsibility until laws require them to do so. Companies like Tom’s of maine, nike’s reuse-a-shoe and Patagonia have take-back programs with drop-off locations or mail-in options. The City of Santa Cruz partners with the County and local retail stores for collection and safe disposal of hazardous materials, including printer ink cartridges, household batteries, paint, compact fluorescent light bulbs, medical sharps and medications. We provide safe and convenient drop-off locations for these difficult to recycle items.

There are many reasons to support EPR. Currently too many products are designed to go to the landfill when discarded. We need a shift in product design so that protecting the environment and safe, sustainable disposal are included in the design concept. In our current system of production, producers are not involved with their product after the consumer is finished with it. At the other end, waste managers have no say in product or package design. All of our modern products use energy in every stage of their existence, from extraction of the earth’s resources and manufacturing, to transportation, product use and disposal. We are faced with many environmental challenges, including plastic pollution, which is destructive, harmful to wildlife and expensive to clean up.

The amount of waste on the production side of our many modern products may

AB 2347 – 2008Recycling Mercury

Thermostats

AB 1343 – 2010Architectural Paint

Stewardship

AB 2398 – 2010Producer Responsibility for

Carpet

SB 254 – 2013Used Mattress Recovery and

Recycling Act

Each year, 15-20 million mattresses are disposed of in the U.S. 80% of the material in these mattresses has the potential to be recycled into useful products. The most recent ePr law in California is the used Mattress Recovery Act of 2013. In response to that legislation, the international Sleep Products association has created a product stewardship organization called the mattress recycling Council to develop and implement a statewide mattress recycling program. Their primary goal is to increase mattress recycling opportunities while decreasing the impacts of illegal dumping. The program will minimize recycling costs to consumers and local government and place the primary responsibility on mattress producers. The program will also help develop end-markets for recycled material from mattresses and box springs. The mattress Council submitted their recycling plan to the California Department of resources recycling and recovery (CalRecycle) in July 2015. If approved, the mattress recovery program will begin in January 2016.

The City of Santa Cruz resource

recovery Facility currently accepts mattresses and box springs for recycling. Customers pay a fee for this service and the City pays transportation costs. During the month of June 2015, we received over 420 mattresses. We then paid $3,600 to cover the cost of transporting and recycling those mattresses. Under the new program, all consumers will pay an up-front recycling fee when they purchase a new mattress. This fee will help fund the recycling program at no additional cost to the City.

To learn more about the mattress recycling program, visit: www.mattressrecyclingcouncil.org. Stay tuned for more information in the coming months.

Painting Santa Cruz Green

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California’s paint stewardship program began in October 2012. As a result, residents can recycle leftover paint more easily and in more locations. The voluntary paint take-back program is operated by PaintCare, a non-profit organization funded by the american Coatings association (aCa), to help our state and several others collect leftover and unwanted paint. Collection services apply to both oil-based and latex architectural paint used for the interior or exterior of buildings. The program accepts paint in five-gallon or smaller cans with the original label intact. PaintCare also accepts primers, stains, sealers and varnish. The program cannot take aerosols, solvents or products made for industrial use. Once collected, the paint is packed and sent to facilities to be sorted. Oil-based paint is burned to recover energy. Latex paint is reprocessed into new paint or made into other products.

The paint recycling process begins when you purchase a new can of paint. Each can sold in California has a small fee (paint stewardship assessment) placed on it. That fee is used to pay for the cost of recycling and the administration of the program. PaintCare makes it easy for you to dispose of your unwanted paint in Santa Cruz. Kelly

moore at 1001 ocean Street, Sherwin-Williams at 408 Front Street and Greenspace at 719 Swift Street accept paint for recycling. When you decide it’s time, please call ahead to confirm store hours and to make sure they have space to accept the amount that you wish to recycle.

The household hazardous Waste site at the Santa Cruz resource recovery Facility, located at 605 Dimeo Lane, also accepts unwanted paint on Saturdays only, from 7:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m.

Thanks to PaintCare, California has a sustainable way to collect the state’s leftover paint and turn it into something useful. For more information, visit: www.paintcare.org.

© iStock.com | aoldman

Carpet Recycling in Santa CruzMore than 360 million pounds of carpet are buried in California landfills every year. California passed a Carpet Stewardship law in 2010 to support carpet recycling, and now, through the Carpet america recovery effort (Care), you can recycle carpet and

area rugs at a discounted rate at our Santa Cruz Resource Recovery Facility. The carpet must be separated from padding, clear of tack strips, nails and other debris, and rolled in manageable lengths. For guidelines, visit: www.cityofsantacruz.com/

reducewaste.When you recycle carpet,

you help save natural resources, conserve landfill space and save money. Recycling allows a product to become a new resource at the end of its useful life rather than sitting in a landfill. Recycled carpet fiber can go into the production of new carpet, padding, erosion control products, construction materials and automotive products.

For more information, visit: www.carpetrecovery.org.

Battery Recycling Just Got EasierWithout batteries, you couldn’t text a friend while watching your daughter’s soccer game, play “Candy Crush” in your spare time or listen to your favorite music while on the treadmill at the gym. Batteries provide on-the-go electricity for all of our handheld devices. We use a lot of batteries in the U.S. all year long, but especially during the winter holiday season. In fact, 40% of all the batteries used in the U.S. are purchased during November and December.

recycling those batteries just got easier through a new take-back program operated by Call2Recycle, a battery stewardship organization. There are locations throughout the City and County of Santa Cruz where

you can drop off your household batteries for recycling. The program is funded by battery manufacturers and provided at no cost to the participating retailers, libraries or local government. Through this program,

you can recycle all household batteries, including aa, aaa, C, D, 9-volt, button cell, alkaline, lithium, rechargeable, phone, hearing aid, watch and small tool—any type of small battery.

Call2Recycle will recycle batteries to the highest standards of resource conservation and environmental protection. For a complete list of drop-off locations in the City of Santa Cruz, visit: www.cityofsantacruz.com/batteries.

A Bright Light Bulb of an Idea

© iStock.com | Gerakl

Compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFLs) are great energy savers, but they do contain a tiny amount of mercury, which can harm the environment if the bulbs are not recycled properly. It is illegal to throw CFLs, fluorescent tubes, high-density discharge bulbs, metal halide bulbs and neon bulbs in the trash or recycling. The City and County have formed a partnership to fund a voluntary take-back program for CFls and fluorescent tubes. Residents may take compact fluorescent bulbs and fluorescent tubes (4 ft. or less) to these City of Santa Cruz locations for safe recycling:l ACE Hardware, 855 Almar Ave. or 1214

Soquel Ave.

l Greenspace, 719 Swift St.l Illuminee, 402 Ingalls St., Suite 23l Riverside Lighting, 300 Soquel Ave.l San Lorenzo Lumber, 235 River St.l Resource Recovery Facility, 605 Dimeo Ln.

Talk about Recycling

a recent news story reported that there are more cell phones used daily than toothbrushes worldwide. That is an astonishing number of cell phones—more than 4 billion worldwide! With the average

mobile phone in the U.S. used for just 18 months, 100 million phones are discarded annually either because they are damaged or are replaced by a newer model. About half of those discarded cellular devices, some 50 million phones and their batteries, are sitting on a closet shelf or hiding in the junk drawer rather than being properly recycled.

Cell phone recycling is easy—simply drop off your cell phone at any Call2Recycle battery retail location or any of the Santa Cruz Public library branches. Most retailers that sell mobile

phones will gladly accept your old phone and battery for recycling when you replace it with a new one.

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© iStock.com | Alatom

Every Mattress Matters

be out of our direct line of sight, but it affects our environment, public health and the safety of workers. EPR allows for the costs of safe treatment and disposal to be incorporated into the total cost of a product. To learn more, visit: California Department of resources recycling and recovery (CalRecycle) at www.CalRecycle.ca.gov or California Product Stewardship Council at www.calpsc.org.

under the current ePr laws in California, manufacturers are allowed to work together to create a product stewardship organization that will set up and operate the take-back program for their industry. Examples include PaintCare

(paint manufacturers), the Carpet america recovery effort (Care, carpet recycling) and the new mattress recycling Council in California.

europe is way ahead of us in ePr efforts, but we can expect to see more laws of this type in California in the future given the diverse number of products consumed and disposed of in modern society. Producer responsibility programs will continue to address hazardous and problematic items, taking the burden of disposal costs off of local government and placing it back on the producer.

California Extended Producer Responsibility Laws by Year

© iStock.com | Dusty Pixel

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It’s easy to think about buying used or buying less. But what about using what you already have and not buying anything at all?

artist Sarah lazarovic tackles this question in her book, A Bunch of Pretty Things I Did Not Buy. By looking back on her own spending habits, she explains how we’ve moved from simply being consumers, buying what we need and using it, to overconsumption.

lazarovic decided to counteract this trend in her life by not buying any clothes or housewares and taking her time, encouraging others to try her method.

“i’m slow, steady, and intent on quality,” she writes. “What i love best is how time often reveals a solution to what i need that doesn’t involve buying.”

in a culture that encourages us to race to the sale or make a purchase before it’s “too late,” it’s hard to think about not buying and doing so slowly. But following Lazarovic’s Buyerarchy of Needs shows how many other ways there are to find “new” stuff. Buying only what you want and need means you will use what you own, creating less waste both in your life and in the world.

Page 2 Fall 2015 Page 3 Fall 2015

Big, broken items are difficult to get rid of. If you have an old refrigerator, washing machine, couch or TV that no longer works, the City of Santa Cruz will collect these large, unwanted items from the curb in front of your house! Appliance and Bulky Item Pickup Day is Saturday, November 21. To receive this service, you must call

Customer Service at 420-5220 by 5 p.m. on Thursday, November 19. Pickup is free, but there is a recycling fee for certain items. You may use your FREE service tags for curbside appliance pickup. You will need to use one tag for each refrigerator, air conditioner, freezer, or other appliance and one tag for each mattress or box springs.

recycling gets most of the headlines, but the other two rs, reduce and reuse, deserve more credit because they actually prevent discards—no recyclables and no trash. Because there are hundreds of ways you can turn items into something new (and thousands of Pinterest boards to show you how), reuse can sometimes seem overwhelming, especially if you aren’t much of a do-it-yourselfer. But it doesn’t have to be overwhelming at all! Reuse can be quick and easy. Here are seven simple ways to incorporate reuse into your day:

1. Carry a reusable water bottle. reusable water bottles reduce greenhouse gas emissions, energy used to produce plastic, and transportation costs to get water to stores. By bringing a bottle to meetings and outdoor events, you can avoid buying plastic water bottles or using disposable cups. Tap water is just as good as bottled water (and much cheaper!). If you love the taste of filtered water, invest in a water filter pitcher that you can use at home or the office.

2. Keep a reuse bin in your kitchen. anytime you come across a paper clip, twist tie, paper tube, plastic tub, glass jar, rubber band, plastic bag—anything that can be reused!—place it into this bin. Before purchasing anything new, look through your reuse bin to see if you can use what you already have on hand. glass jars and a little ribbon become instant centerpieces, and plastic bags can serve as packaging materials to cushion shipments.

Be sure to label and organize the bin so that you use what’s inside!

3. If anyone in your family packs a lunch or snack, use a reusable lunch box or bag and washable containers. These containers are easy to fill and reuse, and they keep everything fresh until it’s time to eat. The bag and some ice packs can also act as a mini cooler. You can even reuse an old drink

bottle to make your own ice pack. Just fill an empty bottle about three-quarters full of water, leave the lid off, and set it into the freezer. By morning, you can screw on the cap and, ta-da, you’ve created an ice pack. Say goodbye to brown bag lunches and single-use plastic snack bags!

4. Bring your own reusable shopping bags to the grocery or other store. You can find these

Recycling for theEvil Genius

russel gehrke, author of Recycling Projects for the Evil Genius, is the kind of guy who appreciates a challenge. He takes someone else’s problem or question and sees it as an opportunity to create something useful. He employs an engineer’s understanding of how things work and applies an inventor’s spark to see how things might work better, work in a different application, or work for a different user. In that respect, the word “genius” in the title is appropriate. in this book, gehrke assembles a collection of projects with an environmental theme. While many of these feature the recycling of post-consumer products, the title doesn’t capture the full range of what is offered here.

The projects on recycling plastics, asphalt shingles, and paper fibers (Chapters 5 and 6) are the meat and potatoes of the book. after chapters on the author’s personal experiences and beliefs, as well as the current state of recycling, household cleaners, and pest control, the real fun begins. The first three projects teach the reader how to manufacture wafer board from mixed plastics, cut those boards into dimensional lumber, and construct a birdhouse from that lumber. You may not believe you would dare to attempt such a thing. However, the background information provided, combined with the detailed material lists, safety tips, and step-by-step instructions, will have you cheerfully melting plastics on a cookie sheet in your kitchen oven. That is the evil genius part of this book.

The author has tried every project presented and worked out the kinks and provides the reader with the tools to succeed at making things. Like any good how-to book, it not only educates the reader, but it also builds the reader’s confidence to try progressively more difficult and complicated tasks.

after the birdhouse, gehrke shows you how to make landscape blocks from recycled plastics and paver bricks and road patch from recycled asphalt shingles. Chapter 6 is all about making durable building materials from recycled paper and concrete. Learn to make landscape blocks from concrete papier-mâché. Then use those blocks to build raised bed gardens, landscape retaining walls, and storage sheds. After that, he shows you how to form this cheap, durable material into planters, birdbaths, stepping stone walkways, and tabletops.

in just 15 pages of Chapter 7, gehrke covers composting in a way that brings a beginner up to speed quickly. He includes six simple, safe projects on composting, as well as fermentation and the production of compost tea for use as a liquid fertilizer on plants. Most of these are suitable for anyone with at least a small yard.

The chapter on cleaning projects (Chapter 8) is mostly about replacing expensive, store-bought products with effective, environmentally-friendly alternatives that save you money. Similarly, the chapter on weed and pest control (Chapter 9)

provides you with the knowledge and confidence to produce effective alternatives to the expensive products most people use to control weeds and bugs. While both of these chapters feature the reuse of packaging items as applicators, the primary benefits are minimizing toxics and reducing costs. For that reason, these two chapters probably hold the greatest potential for individual readers to permanently change their behavior in an environmentally positive way.

Chapter 10 has 101 quick tips on how to reuse everything from aluminum foil (to clean your barbeque grill) to used fabric softener sheets (to clean soap and hard water stains from shower doors). He also provides 20 quick and easy projects that you may find useful, helpful, educational, or just too crazy not to try.

if you are willing to try new things and want to save money and do something good for the environment, this is a great book for you. If you are a parent, teacher, scout leader, or other adult who is interested in fun projects that help young people learn about biology, chemistry, earth science, and the world in which they live, you will find a lot of useful experiments and instructions here.

© Sarah Lazarovic, used with permission

The Buyerarchyof Needs

7 ways to reuse every day

© iStock.com | Art Boy MB

bags at most major retailers, or, if you’re feeling crafty, make your own with old fabric or a worn T-shirt and some creativity. Some stores will even give you a small discount for using your own bags. keep the bags in your car or by the front or back door so you never forget to use them.

5. Use cloth napkins and dish towels in the kitchen instead of their paper counterparts. Clean up any large messes with rags made by cutting up old clothing or bath towels. Throw everything in the wash and use it again!

6. Turn leftovers into new meals before they go bad. Make yesterday’s grilled chicken into chicken fettuccine or transform old stir-fry vegetables into taco filling. Everyone will forget dinner was once leftovers and gobble it down.

7. Visit your local library for books, CDs, and DVDs instead of purchasing new ones. Some libraries even have magazines to check out so you can avoid the extra paper waste.

reuse doesn’t have to be time-consuming or require super-human craft skills. You can easily make it part of your routine. If you reuse every day, it will be easy to reduce your waste and make your life a little more eco-friendly!

Santa Cruz

Garage Sale Weekend

October 10 & 11

Your Trash Might Be Someone Else’s Treasureare you ready to clear out some clutter? Start planning and cleaning up now to be part of Santa Cruz garage Sale Weekend

on October 10 and 11. This is a great time to clean out your closets, garage and cabinets so you can sell items that you no

longer need. The City of Santa Cruz sponsors garage Sale Weekend each october to promote reuse in our community. add your sale to the online garage Sale Treasure Map. Learn more at: www.cityofsantacruz.com/garagesales.

(831) 420-5160www.cityofsantacruz.com

❝ ❞Page 4 Fall 2015

Fall 2015

We want your suggestions,questions and comments!

Public Works Department809 Center Street, Room 201

Santa Cruz, CA 95060831-420-5160

www.cityofsantacruz.com

The Santa Cruz Public Works Department provides the City of Santa Cruz with a variety of services including engineering design, traffic engineering and maintenance, storm water management, street maintenance, resource recovery management, wastewater management, flood control and parking control. The Public Works Department is committed to bringing the Santa Cruz community the highest possible quality of life.

Funded by City of Santa Cruz Public WorksCopyright© 2015

City of Santa Cruz Public Works and Eco Partners, Inc.All rights reserved.

PrinTeD on 100% reCyCleD PaPer WiTh 70% PoST-ConSumer neWS ConTenT, uSing

Soy inkS

What Is Extended Producer Responsibility?our City of Santa Cruz is unique in so many ways, from its natural beauty to the diverse people who call it home. Santa Cruz is also unique in how it manages waste. We haul trash and recycling with our own fleet of hybrid trucks and a staff of solid waste workers, whereas many other municipalities use outside contractors. The City operates its own resource recovery Facility, which includes both a recycling center and a landfill.

Santa Cruz is a great little beach town where life is simple, but trash is not as simple as it once was. It has become more and more complicated over the years. During the 1920s when our City landfill opened, garbage was fairly uncomplicated, consisting of only 10% man-made materials. Today, most of our waste consists of manufactured products and packaging. We have electronic devices that quickly become obsolete and are discarded for newer models. more and more products and their packaging are designed for a single use with convenience weighted over environmental consequences. Packaging has become a multi-layer and multi-material affair with cardboard, metal and different grades of plastic in a single container or package. All of these new products and packages have to go somewhere at the end of their useful life. Currently, it is local government that has to figure out how to deal with all of the resulting waste, while the maker of the product and packaging has no responsibility whatsoever once the product leaves their factory gates.

So, along comes the concept of Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR). The term has been a part of the solid waste management language for many years. It was first introduced in Sweden in 1990. So what is it and why do local and state governments support the idea?

in short, extended Producer responsibility refers to a mandatory type of product stewardship. Instead of local government carrying the sole burden of disposal costs, ePr places the primary responsibility on the producer or the brand owner of a product. Most producer responsibility laws target products that contain hazardous materials or products that are difficult and costly to deal with when they are discarded.

There are currently four ePr laws in California (see box). These laws put the disposal responsibility back on the producer. The maker of a product has the greatest ability to implement changes in product and package design to minimize the negative impacts that their products have on human health and the environment. EPR laws encourage companies to do just that.

Some innovative and proactive companies are taking responsibility for their products by designing them with sustainable materials and end-of-use disposal in mind. Yet in many cases, companies will do nothing to accept responsibility until laws require them to do so. Companies like Tom’s of maine, nike’s reuse-a-shoe and Patagonia have take-back programs with drop-off locations or mail-in options. The City of Santa Cruz partners with the County and local retail stores for collection and safe disposal of hazardous materials, including printer ink cartridges, household batteries, paint, compact fluorescent light bulbs, medical sharps and medications. We provide safe and convenient drop-off locations for these difficult to recycle items.

There are many reasons to support EPR. Currently too many products are designed to go to the landfill when discarded. We need a shift in product design so that protecting the environment and safe, sustainable disposal are included in the design concept. In our current system of production, producers are not involved with their product after the consumer is finished with it. At the other end, waste managers have no say in product or package design. All of our modern products use energy in every stage of their existence, from extraction of the earth’s resources and manufacturing, to transportation, product use and disposal. We are faced with many environmental challenges, including plastic pollution, which is destructive, harmful to wildlife and expensive to clean up.

The amount of waste on the production side of our many modern products may

AB 2347 – 2008Recycling Mercury

Thermostats

AB 1343 – 2010Architectural Paint

Stewardship

AB 2398 – 2010Producer Responsibility for

Carpet

SB 254 – 2013Used Mattress Recovery and

Recycling Act

Each year, 15-20 million mattresses are disposed of in the U.S. 80% of the material in these mattresses has the potential to be recycled into useful products. The most recent ePr law in California is the used Mattress Recovery Act of 2013. In response to that legislation, the international Sleep Products association has created a product stewardship organization called the mattress recycling Council to develop and implement a statewide mattress recycling program. Their primary goal is to increase mattress recycling opportunities while decreasing the impacts of illegal dumping. The program will minimize recycling costs to consumers and local government and place the primary responsibility on mattress producers. The program will also help develop end-markets for recycled material from mattresses and box springs. The mattress Council submitted their recycling plan to the California Department of resources recycling and recovery (CalRecycle) in July 2015. If approved, the mattress recovery program will begin in January 2016.

The City of Santa Cruz resource

recovery Facility currently accepts mattresses and box springs for recycling. Customers pay a fee for this service and the City pays transportation costs. During the month of June 2015, we received over 420 mattresses. We then paid $3,600 to cover the cost of transporting and recycling those mattresses. Under the new program, all consumers will pay an up-front recycling fee when they purchase a new mattress. This fee will help fund the recycling program at no additional cost to the City.

To learn more about the mattress recycling program, visit: www.mattressrecyclingcouncil.org. Stay tuned for more information in the coming months.

Painting Santa Cruz Green

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California’s paint stewardship program began in October 2012. As a result, residents can recycle leftover paint more easily and in more locations. The voluntary paint take-back program is operated by PaintCare, a non-profit organization funded by the american Coatings association (aCa), to help our state and several others collect leftover and unwanted paint. Collection services apply to both oil-based and latex architectural paint used for the interior or exterior of buildings. The program accepts paint in five-gallon or smaller cans with the original label intact. PaintCare also accepts primers, stains, sealers and varnish. The program cannot take aerosols, solvents or products made for industrial use. Once collected, the paint is packed and sent to facilities to be sorted. Oil-based paint is burned to recover energy. Latex paint is reprocessed into new paint or made into other products.

The paint recycling process begins when you purchase a new can of paint. Each can sold in California has a small fee (paint stewardship assessment) placed on it. That fee is used to pay for the cost of recycling and the administration of the program. PaintCare makes it easy for you to dispose of your unwanted paint in Santa Cruz. Kelly

moore at 1001 ocean Street, Sherwin-Williams at 408 Front Street and Greenspace at 719 Swift Street accept paint for recycling. When you decide it’s time, please call ahead to confirm store hours and to make sure they have space to accept the amount that you wish to recycle.

The household hazardous Waste site at the Santa Cruz resource recovery Facility, located at 605 Dimeo Lane, also accepts unwanted paint on Saturdays only, from 7:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m.

Thanks to PaintCare, California has a sustainable way to collect the state’s leftover paint and turn it into something useful. For more information, visit: www.paintcare.org.

© iStock.com | aoldman

Carpet Recycling in Santa CruzMore than 360 million pounds of carpet are buried in California landfills every year. California passed a Carpet Stewardship law in 2010 to support carpet recycling, and now, through the Carpet america recovery effort (Care), you can recycle carpet and

area rugs at a discounted rate at our Santa Cruz Resource Recovery Facility. The carpet must be separated from padding, clear of tack strips, nails and other debris, and rolled in manageable lengths. For guidelines, visit: www.cityofsantacruz.com/

reducewaste.When you recycle carpet,

you help save natural resources, conserve landfill space and save money. Recycling allows a product to become a new resource at the end of its useful life rather than sitting in a landfill. Recycled carpet fiber can go into the production of new carpet, padding, erosion control products, construction materials and automotive products.

For more information, visit: www.carpetrecovery.org.

Battery Recycling Just Got EasierWithout batteries, you couldn’t text a friend while watching your daughter’s soccer game, play “Candy Crush” in your spare time or listen to your favorite music while on the treadmill at the gym. Batteries provide on-the-go electricity for all of our handheld devices. We use a lot of batteries in the U.S. all year long, but especially during the winter holiday season. In fact, 40% of all the batteries used in the U.S. are purchased during November and December.

recycling those batteries just got easier through a new take-back program operated by Call2Recycle, a battery stewardship organization. There are locations throughout the City and County of Santa Cruz where

you can drop off your household batteries for recycling. The program is funded by battery manufacturers and provided at no cost to the participating retailers, libraries or local government. Through this program,

you can recycle all household batteries, including aa, aaa, C, D, 9-volt, button cell, alkaline, lithium, rechargeable, phone, hearing aid, watch and small tool—any type of small battery.

Call2Recycle will recycle batteries to the highest standards of resource conservation and environmental protection. For a complete list of drop-off locations in the City of Santa Cruz, visit: www.cityofsantacruz.com/batteries.

A Bright Light Bulb of an Idea

© iStock.com | Gerakl

Compact fluorescent light bulbs (CFLs) are great energy savers, but they do contain a tiny amount of mercury, which can harm the environment if the bulbs are not recycled properly. It is illegal to throw CFLs, fluorescent tubes, high-density discharge bulbs, metal halide bulbs and neon bulbs in the trash or recycling. The City and County have formed a partnership to fund a voluntary take-back program for CFls and fluorescent tubes. Residents may take compact fluorescent bulbs and fluorescent tubes (4 ft. or less) to these City of Santa Cruz locations for safe recycling:l ACE Hardware, 855 Almar Ave. or 1214

Soquel Ave.

l Greenspace, 719 Swift St.l Illuminee, 402 Ingalls St., Suite 23l Riverside Lighting, 300 Soquel Ave.l San Lorenzo Lumber, 235 River St.l Resource Recovery Facility, 605 Dimeo Ln.

Talk about Recycling

a recent news story reported that there are more cell phones used daily than toothbrushes worldwide. That is an astonishing number of cell phones—more than 4 billion worldwide! With the average

mobile phone in the U.S. used for just 18 months, 100 million phones are discarded annually either because they are damaged or are replaced by a newer model. About half of those discarded cellular devices, some 50 million phones and their batteries, are sitting on a closet shelf or hiding in the junk drawer rather than being properly recycled.

Cell phone recycling is easy—simply drop off your cell phone at any Call2Recycle battery retail location or any of the Santa Cruz Public library branches. Most retailers that sell mobile

phones will gladly accept your old phone and battery for recycling when you replace it with a new one.

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.com

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Every Mattress Matters

be out of our direct line of sight, but it affects our environment, public health and the safety of workers. EPR allows for the costs of safe treatment and disposal to be incorporated into the total cost of a product. To learn more, visit: California Department of resources recycling and recovery (CalRecycle) at www.CalRecycle.ca.gov or California Product Stewardship Council at www.calpsc.org.

under the current ePr laws in California, manufacturers are allowed to work together to create a product stewardship organization that will set up and operate the take-back program for their industry. Examples include PaintCare

(paint manufacturers), the Carpet america recovery effort (Care, carpet recycling) and the new mattress recycling Council in California.

europe is way ahead of us in ePr efforts, but we can expect to see more laws of this type in California in the future given the diverse number of products consumed and disposed of in modern society. Producer responsibility programs will continue to address hazardous and problematic items, taking the burden of disposal costs off of local government and placing it back on the producer.

California Extended Producer Responsibility Laws by Year

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