Brookline Gearing Up for Major Shift in Recycling Collection

Brookline public works officials have ordered some 13,500 customized plastic bins as the town prepares to switch over to a new recycling process in a little more than a month.

Starting Oct. 4, residents who use municipal trash collection services will no longer be required to sort paper products from other recyclables. Under the new system, referred to as "single-stream recycling," all recyclable materials can be placed in special blue "toters," which the town will deliver sometime in November.

"We're urging everyone to get excited about single-stream recycling," said Andrew Pappastergion, commissioner of the Department of Public Works.

The town has ordered more than 13,000 of the plastic toters, at a cost of around $565,000, as part of a larger collection contract with Waste Management. Most of the toters will hold 96 gallons, though some smaller bins, holding just 64 gallons, will be available for residents who have trouble using the larger containers.

Public works officials are asking most residents to try using the larger toters before requesting the smaller ones.

"I would suggest that unless it's clear cut, that their needs are very clear cut, that they wait until we deliver the toters," Pappastergion said. "At that point, we'd have personnel available to deal with any issue as it comes up."

Residents who have trouble with the larger bins can call 617-879-4908 to discuss alternative recycling options.

Public works officials cannot say exactly when the bins will be delivered to individual homes, but Pappastergion said they would likely arrive in the second or third week of September. The town's waste-collection contractor will not accept the Brookline's older blue bins after Oct. 4, but officials have suggested that residents could use them to move recyclables in and out of the home.

The new, larger bins are similar in color and shape to those already in use by the City of Newton, but will be embossed with the Brookline town seal in white, marked with a serial identification number and tagged with a radio-frequency identification device.

"We're not worried about losing any," Pappastergion said.

Brookline's Solid Waste Advisory Committee has posted additional information about the switch to single-stream recycling on the town's website.