Join us for one more free green class this month, this time on the rewards of recycling!  Learn exactly what you can and can’t recycle in your curbside bin. Also find out how you can get great benefits from recycling such as gift cards to your favorite restaurants, stores and attractions. Get an update about the City of Cincinnati’s enhanced recycling program. In the past year, the city switched from 18 gallon bins to larger 63 and 96 gallon rolling carts. As of December 2010, with just 50% of the city having received the new carts, the monthly tonnage record was exceeded, in the 21 year history of the program. Over 1500 tons was recycled, 300 tons higher than any month in history. Now, 8 months later, find out how much more has been recycled. RecycleBank will also be here to show how it pays to recycle.

Recycling rates have increased from 40% to 75% in the past year, and have saved the city over $900,000 while creating jobs and diverting so much waste from entering the landfill.

Join us in Frisch’s Theater on Monday, August 29th from Noon to 1pm for this informative class! Class is free for guests with a zoo membership or paid admission, but space is limited. Please RSVP to Fia at (513) 487-3355 by Sunday, August 28th.

Cincinnati is enhancing their recycling service by partnering with RecycleBank – a rewards program that motivates people to take greener actions, like household recycling, by rewarding them with points that are redeemable online for rewards from local and national retailers, restaurants, pharmacies, grocers and more. Similar to frequent flier programs, the more a community recycles, the more RecycleBank Points participating households earn. Single or multi-family residences with Cincinnati curbside trash service are eligible to participate in the program free of charge.

RecycleBank partners with over 1,500 local and national businesses, including the Cincinnati Zoo & Botanical Garden. Visit RecycleBank’s website for a complete list of reward partners in your area. Register on their website, or call 1-888-727-2978, to create and account and redeem your rewards. Once you register with RecycleBank, points earned because of the amount of material your community recycles will automatically show up in your RecycleBank account. Points can then be redeemed for rewards at any RecycleBank rewards partner. Active participants have saved up to $200 a year by redeeming their points.

Households in Phases I & II of Cincinnati’s recycling program have received their new recycling carts. To find out which phase you are in and which week you will be picked up, check out the City’s enhanced recycling program overview at: www.cincinnatirecycles.org or call 513-591-6000.

This week begins the first phase of Cincinnati’s enhanced recycling program. 25,000 residents received new, 96-gallon or 64-gallon recycling carts, complete with wheels for easier transport and a lid to prevent litter. The program is designed to encourage recycling – the more residents recycle, the more rewards points they receive. Through an incentive program called RecycleBank, residents will be able to redeem their points at stores, restaurants and local attractions such as the Cincinnati Zoo. Each cart will have a bar code, identifying an address that the cart belongs to. The amount inside the cart, collected biweekly, will be weighed. Recyclers will earn bonus points based on the amount the city recycles, not just each individual cart. This will hopefully get residents to motivate and encourage one another to recycle more. Picking up the carts biweekly instead of weekly will save the City approximately $700,000 a year. The rest of the City will be included in the new program by January/February 2011.

According to the Office of Environmental Quality, in 2009, the City of Cincinnati residents sent 94,000 tons of material to the landfill, and recycled 13,000 tons of material. Recycling materials creates more jobs than placing items in a landfill, and recycling diverts tons of trash from being added to that landfill. The enhanced recycling program will allow the City of Cincinnati to save money on avoided landfill fees and waste collection, create jobs, reduce pollution, save natural resources and save landfill space.

For more information, visit the City of Cincinnati’s Recycling website.

Tuesday, October 5^th, Mayor Mark Mallory, the Office of Environmental Quality, RecycleBank, Rumpke Recycling, Cascade Engineering, and Proctor & Gamble’s Future Friendly will host a press conference explaining the program details. The conference will be held at 10am at Annwood Park, 1900 Madison Road. The event includes: program explanation, new automated equipment demonstration, and RecycleBank reward partners meet and greet.  Food and refreshments will be provided from RecycleBank partners such as Cincinnati Museum Center, Cincinnati Zoo, City Barbeque, The Coca Cola Company, Dewey’s Pizza, Graeter’s, Long John Silvers, Park+Vine and P&G’s Future Friendly. The first 100 residents to attend will receive 50 extra bonus RecycleBank points.