By Jason Evans

Staff Reporter

jevans@thepccourier.com

CENTRAL — The town of Central is suspending its recycling program.

Mayor Mac Martin announced the suspension of the town’s recycling program in a letter to residents issued April 21.

“After much discussion and review of recycling costs and industry changes, we are suspending the Town of Central Recycling Program effective April 28,” Martin wrote. “Most of these circumstances are market driven and out of our control.”

The last pickup of recycling was set to occur on Monday, with sanitation department employees picking up recycling bins on that day as well, he wrote.

“Our hope is to one day reinstate our recycling program, but at this current time, it is not feasible to continue,” Martin wrote.

The town’s recycling program is more than 20 years old, he wrote.

“The Town of Central elected officials have always prided themselves in the fact that we were one of the first recycling programs in Pickens County,” Martin wrote.

Restrictions were a factor in the decision to suspend the program, he wrote.

“At the present time, recycling has become very difficult with restrictive requirements as set forth by the recycling companies where the collected items are transferred,” Martin wrote. “Due to economic changes and especially historically low oil prices which drive the recycling efforts, companies have become more and more restrictive as to what they will attempt to recycle and how we have to deliver it.”

Officials never viewed the recycling program as a money-making endeavor, but “we are not getting any money from the recycling company to assist in covering the costs to collect recyclables,” he wrote.

“Companies are now requiring that we separate the recycling by product and separate the different color of glass,” Martin wrote. “They will only take recycling plastic number 1 and 2.”

The process needed to comply with the new recycling requirements “is very labor-intensive and costly for the town,” he wrote.

“With the new list of items that recycling companies will accept, most of what we used to recycle is no longer being accepted,” Martin wrote.

In the short term, the Pickens County Recycling Center at 600 Chastain Road will accept presorted recycling items, he wrote.

The cardboard/oil recycling drop-off site is located at 415 Gaines St. by the old jail/depot.

“On behalf of all the Town of Central’s elected officials, I would like to thank the citizens for their recycling efforts and their continued support,” Martin wrote. “We look forward to the future when we can restart our recycling program.”