Please Don't Do This

Two items/ reminders.

Do not park motorcycles, scooters, bicycles or anything else on the dumpster side of the building. The dumpster-side driveway is for short term parking only. Parking things like scooters here impedes temporary automobile parking by taking up space in an already small area.  There is some parking available for scooters, and motorcycles on the E-market side of the building. Contact Markwood if you have questions about this.
 

You need to break down your cardboard so that it fits inside the containers. Cut it with a knife, tear it, fold it in half but do not place cardboard on the ground outside of the recycling containers.

It is extremely lame. If it rains it makes a soggy mess, and the recycling company will not take items that are not actually in the recycling containers. Perhaps you were expecting someone else to do it for you? That is not a service we provide. 

Pay Attention to Recycling Issues or Pay Fines

As the new single-point recycling program continues to roll out, we are experiencing some ongoing issues. We need to address these as a community or there will be consequences: i.e. fines from the city of Salem, which will be progressively increasing as violations continue. It is important to note that these fines will eventually be passed on to you in the form of increased condo fees. Here are some examples of the RECYCLING ISSUES YOU NEED TO PAY ATTENTION TO:

1. CONTAINERS WITH FOOD IN THEM.
The plastic bottle in the picture below is still full of juice. This is not OK.
RECYCLED MATERIALS CANNOT CONTAIN FOOD.
Empty and wash the containers before you put them in the bin.

2. PIZZA BOXES (CONTAINERS WITH FOOD ON THEM).
The one in the photo had cheese and pizza sauce all over the inside of it . You cannot recycle pizza boxes if they have cheese or sauce on them. Throw them in the dumpster.

3. NOT BREAKING DOWN CARDBOARD BOXES
This has been a major problem. You need to break down boxes until they are COMPLETELY FLAT. If you don't, we run out of space in the containers very quickly, (they only get picked up every 2 weeks) the containers overflow or don't close, and this allows rain and snow to get in, and the wind to blow stuff around the property and into the street.

It is not difficult to break down a box. It takes an extra 30 seconds. Go to the hardware store. Buy a utility knife. Remove any and all packing materials (foam, bubble-wrap, etc.) from the box you are breaking down. Use the knife to cut the seams on your box and flatten it completely. Put it in the recycling bin. Make sure that it actually fits into the bin.
Now, isn't that simple?

4. PLASTIC BAGS 
Do not use them for recycling. Do not put recyclable items into plastic bags and them put them in the bins. Do not put plastic bags of any kind into the recycling bins. This includes shopping bags, green plastic trash bags and white plastic trash bags. Paper bags are OK.
DO NOT PUT PLASTIC BAGS IN RECYCLING.

Please put some effort into this. No one is going to do this for you. It won't take a lot of extra time, and will save us all money. If you have questions please contact the Markwood office. Thank you. 

IMPORTANT NOTICE about TRASH & RECYCLING

You may have noticed a packet of information under your door recently concerning the new trash and recycling program recently instituted by the City of Salem. Read it carefully.
The skinny is that the new program is mandatory, so we have no choice but to comply.
The city has established an 8-week "grace" period during the implementation of this program to allow people to adjust to the new requirements. After that 8 week period, fines will be levied for violations of the recycling rules . These fines can add up quickly. That is a bad thing because eventually those fines will come out of your pocket, so.... please help avoid additional and unnecessary costs by only recycling those materials allowed and by not putting items that are eligible for recycling in the dumpster. Take a look at the sheet. Familiarize yourself with the allowed and disallowed items. PAY ATTENTION to what you are throwing away.
We encourage you to visit www.salem.com for further information.

IMPORTANT Recycling/Trash Changes

You may have noticed some new recycling bins in the side driveway.
A new and improved trash and recycling collection program will begin November 2, 2015.
Please read the following carefully. 

Remember — recycling is mandatory in Salem. 

New Recycling Collection Program
Beginning in November, recycling carts will be collected by an automated process in most neighborhoods. Special trucks with ‘arms’ will pick up your carts and deposit their contents into the truck.
NOTE: Recycling will be collected every other week in the blue 96-gallon cart instead of every week. The old bins will be going away DO NOT USE THE OLD BINS after November 2. Only supplied carts will be collected - trash barrels, blue recycling bins, or any other
receptacles will no longer be acceptable or collected.

Trash & Single Stream Recycling Collection
Salem is now offering ‘single stream’ recycling, which means that paper, plastic, glass bottles and cans may all be mixed together in your recycling cart. That is the good news. The bad news is that they will a lot pickier about what is in the bins. Pay careful attention to what items are allowed and what are not. There is a handy guide on the lid of each bin. If you are in doubt, put it in the dumpster. If you place disallowed items in the bins we run a strong risk of not having our recycling picked up, which besides being a pain in the neck, will be an additional expense for Markwood, and therefore for you.

So to RECAP
• Use the 96-gallon blue cart with the green lid.
• Recycling will be collected every-other-week.
• No sorting is needed.
• DO NOT put recyclables in plastic bags.
• Containers that held food should be rinsed and FREE of FOOD DEBRIS.
 For example: no pizza boxes with grease of cheese on them.
Acceptable materials for curbside recycling include:

A more detailed list of materials that can be recycled will be distributed later this week to all 24 Norman Street residents. You can also obtain more information by visiting  www.Salem.com.
Thank you for your cooperation.

Recycling Etiquette

There are a number of recycling bins available for the use of residents at 24 Norman Street, but after finding loose cardboard blowing around the side parking lot and a pile of boxes next to the bins, we thought it might be helpful to go over some basic rules of recycling and trash "etiquette".

1. Put the appropriate item into the appropriate bin.
People are generally in a hurry to dispose of their trash and recycling as quickly as possible, but taking a few seconds to read the labels on the recycling bins and/or check what is already in them before placing your items would be helpful. The recycling is sorted by item, both by where they put it in  the truck and where it is processed at the plant, so mixing different items in the bins just makes it a slower and more difficult process.

2. Make sure the materials to be recycled are relatively clean.
That means rinsing out bottles and cans and food containers so that there is no visible food residue in them. If you have something with food really stuck in it, say some cardboard food container such as a pizza box, if it is permeated with grease or has cheese stuck to it, please throw it in the trash, not the recycling bins. It's hard enough to keep the dumpster from smelling and being infested with flies, let alone the recycling bins.

3. Break down those cardboard boxes.
Too often people do not take the time to break down their cardboard items (such as large boxes) and leave them in a pile next to the bins.
This is a problem in several instances; when it is raining, when it is windy, when there is mixed packing material (such as styrofoam) in the box. These are all circumstances that either make an unsightly mess, make it almost difficult to recycle the material, or both.
Even if anitem is small enough to fit into the bin without breaking it down, you should break it down as much as possible, or you make it difficult for other tenants to use the bin, leading back to the unsightly piles of stuff outside the bins.

4. Leave the caps on those bottles
Rather than removing the caps from bottles, or throwing them into the bins by themselves, please put the caps back on. We have been told that when they sort the materials, the smaller items often fall into the machinery, and gum up the works.

If everyone could make an effort to follow these 4 guidelines, it would make for a much cleaner, more efficient and less ghetto-looking recycling area. Thank you!