Recycling education efforts increased for Ethnic Expo waste

Organizers of this year’s Ethnic Expo events will be diverting waste from the Bartholomew County landfill through efforts to improve recycling at the festival.

Instead of a single weekend’s worth of activities, this year’s Ethnic Expo will be held over four weekends: June 19th, August 28th, September 11th and October 2nd.

The Bartholomew County Solid Waste Management District’s Citizens Advisory Committee received a grant from the Indiana Department of Environmental Management to increase recycling rates at the festivals. During previous Ethnic Expo events tons of waste has been added to the landfill, especially Styrofoam. The city has tried to increase recycling at the event previously but because of contamination most if not all of the waste still ended up in the landfill.

Local residents will serve as waste station volunteers for each event to help attendees sort their trash into recycling, landfill, and composting. Recyclables and trash will be weighed by category, to show how successful the efforts were at diverting materials from the landfill.