Youth Recycling Initiative Started at Southold School

students have started a pilot youth recycling initiative hoping that, with the help of the , it could spread to and schools next year.

After an internship with the town over the summer, Anne Davey, a Southold High School student, is spear heading the effort to start a town-wide recycling program. Phillip Beltz, Youth Bureau Director, said Southold School was chosen as a pilot for the program because of the town's history of working with Superintendent David Gamberg and because Davey, the driving force behind the idea, goes to school there.

Beltz, Davey, and James Bunchuck presented the idea for the youth recycling program to the Southold Town Board at its work session on Tuesday.

"All of our schools have recycling programs in place, but they could be improved," Beltz.

Davey said Southold High School is not actively recycling but the elementary school teachers started a program and those students do recycle. At the high school, the students do not have recycle bins to throw away plastic bottles or cans.

"It pains me to throw a plastic bottle in the garbage can and not in a recycling bin," Davey said.

Initially, the program would just target cans and not paper and cardboard. According to Davey, this student run program is cost-effective for the school. Environmental Club and Interact students, along with members of the Youth Bureau have taken charge of the program. With the custodians, they have identified a space in the basement where the bottles will be stored. Once a week, the students will sort the cans and return them.

Bunchuck is working with Davey on the program and said it may be cost prohibitive to include paper and cardboard at this time because the schools would need a separate container to store the paper products.

"It's left up to the superintendents, and on a tight budget, if it costs extra money, it's not going to happen," Bunchuck said.

Bunchuck has seen success with a program in the Syracuse area where students separate the paper in the classroom and they store it until a set point during the week. The students then find a way to bring the materials to the transfer station and the schools get a credit back.

The school districts use different garbage carters and there are limited charges to the districts now, Bunchuck said.

"It's mostly brush that is brought in by the school districts. It is conceivable there could be a rebate if the schools brought paper to the transfer station and it would be a direct savings," Bunchuck said.

For now, Davey is excited Southold school is on board with the program.

"We want to see where the kinks and flaws are so we can put a dynamite program in place next year," Davey said.

As an incentive for school to participate, Davey said the recycling program could become a competition between school districts. The winning school could receive a proclamation from the town and a banner, similar to a sports championship banner.

"Right now I'm here for information purposes, but eventually we want to do it everywhere — even in the town parks. We want to make this a town-wide program," Davey said.