Manchester and Coventry are among nine towns and regional entities across the state to receive $15 million for waste management infrastructure projects. The state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection recently announced聽a set of awards in its inaugural Materials Management Infrastructure Grant Program, a competitive funding program billed as “to date the state’s largest investment聽in local and regional waste management infrastructure.”
The program is designed to help municipalities respond to a “waste crisis” as traditional methods of disposing of municipal solid waste are diminishing or becoming more expensive. From its application, Manchester secured just under $4.8 million for a set of initiatives that Town Manager Steve Stephanou said will “increase organics from the waste stream, facilitate plastic film recycling and provide much-needed food waste collection and processing facilities for our region.”
“We look forward to implementing our proposed waste diversion and recycling initiatives to the benefit of our community and the surrounding region,” Stephanou said.