Lianne Zeltinger, Minot

Who, in Minot, is being prohibited or restricted from recycling?

I, personally recycle, reuse and repurpose items. I could always do more. I also pick up litter which, I guess, adds to our local landfill.

I appreciate the due diligence the council is giving this matter of recycling. It is not a simple decision to be made in haste. We have city staff, Jason Sorenson in particular, who has dedicated a great deal of time researching recycling from a municipal standpoint and has shared his wealth of knowledge with us. Minot is in a rather unique situation geographically. We are miles from anywhere in terms of large populations of people, interstate transportation routes or the availability of a river that could be used for transportation.

Sadly, both the lack of population and lack of quick access to interstate transportation to Minnesota add to the financial risk and expense involved in recycling. Our railroad line is the one avenue readily available to us and our Mayor has stated it is cheaper to transport to the west coast than to go east.

In the meantime, we are quite fortunate to have two private enterprise options available to us for recycling through Earth Recycling, who does pick up, and Kalix, our local drop off agent. Earth Recycling operates out of Glenburn, and has contracts with many commercial companies in Minot to pick up items such as metal, paper and cardboard to name a few categories they recycle.

Kalix makes it an easy drive through process to drop off paper, corrugated cardboard, and most plastics. They offer tokens that can either be spent at Market Place or donated to a non-profit entity of one’s choosing. They, in turn, use those tokens to purchase much needed items for their operations from Market Place. I believe Target and Cash wise also accept recycling products, but don’t quote me.

Private companies always have their thumbs on the pulse of what turns a profit, who is taking what product and if there are potential changes being made at the drop off points and quickly make adjustments accordingly. Governments, as we know, move slowly, and can’t make quick adjustments because of rules and regulations.

I would like to see the city make a commitment to maintain an open dialogue with our local private entities and to not infringe upon the private sectors’ enterprises until such time that they choose to no longer recycle.

We just celebrated small business day last Saturday. I believe that should be a year round celebration by both private citizens and governments alike. The city is developing a buy local policy and by not impinging on two local private companies that would parallel the new policy.

As you can see we are not being deprived or prohibited from the opportunity of recycling, except maybe by our own individual self-imposed restrictions. As a community, we already have the opportunity to support our desire to recycle while at the same time support two local businesses in their endeavors of recycling and at no expense to the city.