The City of Montgomery participates in the Hamilton County Residential Recycling Incentive (RRI) program. This program is valuable in that the County divides $1,050,000 annually in RRI funds among Hamilton County communities as an incentive to increase recycling. As a community increases their recycling rate, the community receives more RRI funds.
During 2016, Montgomery received $38,875.98 in RRI incentives. These grant funds must be used to offset the cost of recycling programs within the City. Montgomery contracts with Rumpke for recycling services as well as operating a monthly recycling drop-off program for cardboard and metal.
The City also has periodic shredding and recycling events that are counted in its recycling tonnage. Although these recycling rates do not reflect yard waste tonnage, Hamilton County Solid Waste District will begin accepting yard waste tonnage in the 2018 program. Contributions from income tax dollars into the City’s General Fund operate this weekly recycling program, so there is no direct fee to residents for curbside recycling collection. All recycling events provided by the City are also cost-free to residents.
Montgomery’s 2016 recycling rate was 25.49 percent, with 1,094.95 tons of waste materials being recycled.
While our total generated waste dropped by 8.5 percent over this period, our diversion rate has also fallen from about 30 percent to 25.5 percent; this puts us at a lower RRI incentive.
In 2016, if we diverted another 194 tons (4.5 percent of our total waste), we would have achieved the 30 percent level resulting in incentives of $50,257, an $11,900 increase. Montgomery has been at the 30 percent diversion rate in the past so this level of diversion is achievable. The City continues to look for ways to capture recycle tonnage and asks residents to continue the good work of keeping material out of landfills.
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