Early History

WWRA History 1991 until 2009

Origins:

In 1990, ten municipalities on the western side of Washtenaw County started meeting in an effort to determine whether a recycling center for this side of the county would be a worthwhile venture. The inspiration came from community leaders who remembered the recycling efforts of World War II and were knowledgeable of the nationwide efforts to reinitiate recycling as a community responsibility. These efforts were enhanced by support from the county and the availability of grants for educating the public on the benefits of a recycling program. The Western Washtenaw Recycling Authority was officially formed in 1991 when 8 of the municipalities signed the Articles of Incorporation and By-Laws establishing a unique authority of 8 participating municipalities.

The Success Story

The operations started out small with a used recycling trailer, used baler, a used truck for picking up the bins, 1 or 2 bins in each township and buckets distributed to households in each of the villages willing to recycle. Theses resources were purchased through the sale of bonds by Washtenaw County and repaid from the annual assessments placed on each household plus revenues from the sale of product. The education programs were implemented and started showing progress almost immediately, as almost 300 tons of material was collected the first year. Early challenges were that recycling markets were fluctuating routinely, and WWRA typically had to haul a lot of their own baled product because we could not warehouse enough material to fill a semi-trailer.

However, the founding members faith in the WWRA community began to pay off as material volumes continued to increase. The recycling markets started to stabilize and a solid source of income was realized. Five years into operations, WWRA had redeemed all the bonds sold by the county for the building and equipment. Additionally, WWRA was able to build a storage area for product, which in turn increased the revenue from the sale of the product because we could ensure that a complete semi-trailer load was available for pickup. By the year 2000 collections for the year were over 3,000 tons and rose to 4,000 tons by 2004. The sale of product covered more than half of WWRA’s operating expenses, which allowed the annual assessments to be less than original assessments based on inflationary dollar figures.

The Current Trends and Recycling Efforts

In WWRA member municipalities, the level of recycled product has remained essential stable for the last seven or eight years, with a participation rate of approximately 35% in each member municipality. This is in contrast to state and national trends during that same time, which have shown a decrease in participation rates. The State of Michigan lead the Mid-West in recycling efforts in 2001 and that has eroded to the point that Michigan is now dead last as a recycling state with approximately a 12% recycling rate. According to recent surveys, unwillingness to separate recycling materials into separate containers in the residence is the major contributing factor to this decrease in participation and recycled product volume. F or WWRA, the loss of product volume was noticeable in that our 2002 through 2004 levels were at 4,000 tons per year and by 2009 they had dropped to 3,400 tons. Because of this, many communities are moving to a Single Stream recycling system, to attract a larger portion of the population. Several states have mandated the use of Single Stream recycling. This has proven to provide a significant added advantage, as the capture rate of recycled materials has increased to as high as 75% in those municipalities. Significant increases in revenue from the sale of product have been realized where Single Stream systems are implemented, due to the increases in both the participation rate and the capture rate.

After 18 years of service, a majority of the WWRA equipment is worn out and needs to be replaced. The baler is no longer manufactured and parts are basically impossible to find. Therefore, the WWRA Board of Directors has made the decision to more to a Single Stream system with new modern equipment and a bigger, more efficient building. With this change, WWRA will be able to provide more efficiency and diminish our operational costs. With this move we will be able to implement a more efficient curbside collection system would lead to further savings and greater resident participation. This will be a long-term process, as we need to convince the county to support the move via a bond sale and also convince the municipalities the additional cost of the bond payoff is worth their resident’s investment.