On April thirteenth, the Friends of the Library offered an informational program on recycling. The presentation was given by Health Programs Coordinator, Laura Rogers. The recycling program is new to Safford, having only started in September of 2015. If you’re a City of Safford resident, you probably have a recycling bin. Whether you use this bin is completely up to you. However, the rates of natural decompose for these recyclable materials are sobering. To put it plainly, if you don’t recycle, your trash will outlive you.
If you have the recycling canister from the City of Safford, there are a few things that the city would like for you to know. Plastic bags and pizza boxes cannot be put in the canisters. When you recycle your plastic bottles, the city asks for you to remove the lids from the bottles. We are asked to remove the lids because water can build up on the bottles and contaminate the plastic with mold. The other reason why we are asked to remove the bottle lids is because when the bottles are placed on a crusher, the pressure on the bottle makes it explode. This pressure build up is dangerous in the recycling plant. Below is a list provided by Laura Rogers, of what can be recycled in the blue canister provided by the City of Safford:
Although recycling is a nice notion to many, very few people see it as an absolute necessity. However, what many residents of the Gila Valley do not know is that our local landfill has only two and a half years left in its working time. Chad Hogle at the Safford Landfill, states that landfill employees are working on a vertical permit for the landfill. This permit will allow the landfill to rise up higher than it is now, and will keep the landfill operating for the next thirty years. Nevertheless, with the advantages of recycling, who wouldn’t want keep the waste materials out of our Arizona soil? Hogle is optimistic about our local recycling efforts, “It seems to get better every week,” he stated.
However, for those of us without Safford City Recycling, we are left with many questions. For instance, where can we bring our recyclable materials? Luckily, there are several operating recycling facilities in our valley. These facilities are: Vista Recycling, Graham County Rehabilitation Center, and Metal Mite Recycling.
Lastly, here is the time frame for our recyclable waste-products to decompose in our environment. The statistics are disturbing. Standing as a stark reminder, the numbers below are the harsh evidence that we should teach our children the importance of having respect for our environment. While we can lecture all we want, the best way to teach others is to lead by example. 
