EAGLE, Neb. (KLKN) \u2014 Neighbors in the small village of Eagle say what is meant to be a convenient recycling drop-off site is increasingly being used as a dumping ground for trash.<\/p>\n
Photos shared by residents show trash bags, food waste and other non-accepted items mixed with cardboard, paper and approved recyclables.<\/p>\n
The contamination can result in entire batches of recycling being discarded or require city staff to spend additional hours manually sorting materials.<\/p>\n
\u201cAs a small town, you have to be mindful that someone does have to clean this up,\u201d Willa DiCostanzo said.<\/p>\n
Village officials said clear signage is posted at the site outlining what materials are accepted. Despite those efforts, improper dumping continues.<\/p>\n
The extra labor comes at a cost. During the most recent cleanup, two village staff members and a concerned resident spent about an hour clearing out misplaced trash and sorting recyclables.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s frustrating when that happens,\u201d the resident said, noting that the additional work pulls staff away from other community needs.<\/p>\n
Officials said the village is shifting its focus to education, reminding residents that if an item is not on the approved list, it should not be left at the site.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf you want to recycle, you need to be responsible in recycling and completing it correctly,\u201d another resident said. \u201cIf you don\u2019t, there\u2019s a detriment to many people involved in this process.\u201d<\/p>\n
Village leaders hope renewed outreach and community cooperation will reduce contamination and keep the recycling site operating efficiently for everyone.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"EAGLE, Neb. (KLKN) \u2014 Neighbors in the small village of Eagle say what is meant to be a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":476371,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[47],"tags":[220454,11751,192,2806,6562,79,13485,220455],"class_list":["post-476370","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-dumping-ground","tag-eagle","tag-environment","tag-nebraska","tag-recycling","tag-science","tag-trash","tag-willa-dicostanzo"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/476370","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=476370"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/476370\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/476371"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=476370"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=476370"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=476370"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}