Be a good neighborIn San Dimas, the City and residents work hard to promote and maintain a pleasant living and working environment. Sometimes, City staff members and residents see issues in need of attention.

A common complaint received from residents regards trash cans that are out when they should not be. Trash cans put out too early or left out too late are unsightly and cre-ate parking and street sweeping problems. City regulations require that trash cans cannot be placed out earlier than 3 p.m. on Monday and must be removed by 7 p.m. on Tuesday (the day of collection). Trash cans must be stored in a location that is not visible from the public streets, alleys, and sidewalks.

Another common concern is portable basketball hoops that block sidewalks or are kept in the street. These portable hoops can create problems for pedestrians, limit on-street parking, make it difficult to collect trash and recycling, and restrict access for the street sweeping trucks. City regulations prohibit leaving basketball hoops on a sidewalk or on the street.

The City and your neighbors appreciate your cooperation and compliance with these regulations.

Every year, many families are faced with the challenge of how to dispose of medicines that are not entirely consumed. Prescriptions change, symptoms improve, and individuals fail to take their medications as directed. All of these situations can leave people wondering what to do with unused medication. In addition, over-the-counter medications purchased in large quantities often expire before they are used.

In the City of San Dimas, residents have a convenient and safe disposal option. Any resident can drop off unused and unwanted medications in the Safe Drug Drop-Off container, which is located outside the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department Station at 270 S. Walnut Avenue in San Dimas. The containers are available 24 hours a day and seven days a week to ensure residents can safely and anonymously drop-off any of these items:

• Expiredorunusedprescriptions• Over-the-countermedications• Syringesandlancets(“sharps”)• Illicitdrugs• Anyothercontrolledsubstance

In the past, it was a common practice to flush unneeded medications down the drain. However, we now know that this can pollute ourwaterways.In1999-2000,theU.S.GeologicalSurveyevaluated139streamsin 30 states for pharmaceuticals, hormones, and other organic contaminants. They found contamination in 80% of the streams

tested. Subsequent studies have confirmed these findings. Wastewater treatment plants currently in use were not designed to remove pharmaceuticals. Several layers of additional and expensive treatment would be required to remove all of these chemicals from the water. Over multiple generations, the presence of medications in these bodies of water could impact aquatic life, animals, and even humans.

Saving, storing, or misplacing unwanted prescription drugs raises the possibility that children and others may access these medications, increasing the risk of accidental, inappropriate, or illegal use.

Keep your family, neighbors, our community, and our environment safe. Choose safe disposal with the Safe Drug Drop-Off program.

®

Fall 2013

www.cityofsandimas.comWaste Management

San Gabriel/Pomona Valleywww.keepingsandimas

clean.com909-599-1274

Safe Drug Drop-Off in San Dimas

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What about sharps?

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rdDid you know that it is illegal to throw syringes, lancets, and other sharps used for in-home medical care into garbage or recycling containers? It is. And do you know why? When sharps are mixed with household trash or recyclables, workers on collection vehicles, along sorting lines, and at disposal facilities can be stuck, risking injury and disease and resulting in several months of medical tests and worry. If you use sharps to care for a medical condition, please dispose of them properly.

The City of San Dimas has partnered with Waste Management to offer a convenient, mail-back disposal system. The kits, which are delivered to your home, include everything you will need to dispose of your sharps safely. The first kit per year is free and additional kits are $5 each. To request delivery of a kit to your home, call Waste Management at (909) 599-1274. Kits are delivered at your door on your regular collection day.

Planning to decorate with a real tree at Christmas?

After the holidays, residents with curbside recycling collection will be able to recycle real Christmas trees at the curb for three weeks after Christmas. When

the time comes, please remove all decorations, ornaments, lights, garland, and tinsel, as well as the stand. If the stand is not removed from your tree, the tree

will not be picked up for recycling. If your tree is more than 6 feet tall, please cut it into two pieces before placing it at the curb. When you set your tree at the curb, it should be bare. Place the bare tree next to your recycling bin.

Christmas trees are picked up by a separate truck and will be taken to a facility where they will be shredded and used as “alternative daily cover”atthelandfill.Usingthisshreddedmaterialreducesblowinglitter at the landfill and replaces soil that would need to be purchased to cover each day’s trash. Participation in this program helps the City of San Dimas to meet California requirements to divert thousands of

tons of materials from area landfills. For more information on this or other recycling programs, please

call the City of San Dimas Environmental Coordinator at (909) 394-6240.

Recycle Your Used Motor Oil & FiltersCurbside:1. Next to your garbage, recycling, and yard waste carts.

Drop-Off:

2.

100 W. Bonita Avenue 909-599-6872

3. Los Angeles County Household Hazardous Waste (HHW) Events www.CleanLA.com (888) CLEAN-LA

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In any random, sprawling, decomposing thing is the charming string of its history—and what it will be next.

May Swenson, 1913-1989American poet

Quotes ReQuoted

Take a seat on a

coffin couch

Page 2 Fall 2013

When the rubble of 9/11 had settled, a small tree was trapped under debris and scorched beyond recognition. Yet, miraculously, the Callery pear was still hanging on to life when workers freed the tree. Once in the hands of the Citywide Nursery Director Richie Cabo, the “Survivor Tree” was nursed back to life.

The key to reviving the damaged tree? Fungus preparations and compost. At first, Cabo did not think the tree would make it. But after a year, the pear tree began to show signs of recovery. In fact, the tree did so well that it was planted back where it started, at the 9/11 memorial site. Now the Survivor Tree is over 30 feet tall and still standing—thanks to its caretakers and compost!

Photo Courtesy of PumpkinSky

The tree that compost saved

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C hances are, you’ve never given much thought to “coffin waste.” But former medical examiner Vidal Herrera has found a use for unused and unwanted

coffins. He turns them into couches.Herrera, owner of MorguePropRentals.

com, said the idea came when a set designer asked him to turn a coffin into a couch for use on the television show, “True Blood.” After the couch was delivered, the set designer suggested that Herrera sell them. However, it wasn’t until he displayed a couch at the Monsterpalooza convention in California that he realized a coffin couch business was possible. After that convention, demand for the unique couches came in high volumes.

These coffins don’t come from under the ground, though. Coffins that have been used briefly at funeral homes cannot be resold and are typically thrown out. Some new coffins are slightly damaged during delivery and are also typically thrown out. Herrera buys these coffins, not only saving them from the landfills, but also reusing them in a new and creative way.

Coffin couch construction includes reinforcement with steel rods and the addition of anything from chrome legs and brass plating to drink holders. The 200 couches he has sold can be found at tattoo parlors, miniature golf courses, and hair salons, but mostly in private homes. Herrera plans to turn Coffin Couches into a non-profit that will fund scholarships for future funeral directors and embalmers.

To see pictures of the coffin couches, visit the company’s website at www.coffincouches.com.

“Clean your plate! Don’t you know there are people starving in (fill in the blank)?” To generations of Americans, this admonition was a familiar part of growing up. Whether spoken by your parents, grandparents, first-grade teacher, or Aunt Martha, you probably heard that phrase at some point in your childhood. It wasn’t meant to encourage overeating. Rather, it was an attempt to instill some sense of the value of the food placed before you. Reading Jonathan Bloom’s book, American Wasteland: How America Throws Away Nearly Half of Its Food (And What We Can Do About It), may be a better way to accomplish that goal than Aunt Martha’s, or anyone else’s, scolding.

Of course, failure to clean our plate is not the only source of food waste. And, while it may not surprise you to learn that food is wasted at every step from farm to fork, the scope of the problem will. By Bloom’s own calculation, America’s food waste would fill the 90,000-seat Rose Bowl in Pasadena, CA, between one and two times EACH DAY! As Bloom’s tale unfolds, he reveals not only the astonishing magnitude of the problem, but its significant economic, environmental, and ethical impacts as well. He also outlines the many causes of food waste and offers more than a few practical suggestions for positive change. Through a combination of in-depth interviews and actual work experience, Bloom takes you inside many of the businesses involved in bringing food from fields to your table. He also gives you an insider’s perspective on the charities that divert some of that food to the needy. Because, with all due respect to Aunt Martha, you don’t have to look across an ocean to find hunger—you just need to look across town.

The author whets our appetite with the story of iceberg lettuce and other produce grown in Salinas, CA, and then shipped to a distribution center in Georgia and on to

supermarkets throughout the Southeast. While that distribution chain is long, it is not unusual. The average distance produce travels from farm to consumer is 1,500 miles. At each step, some of the lettuce goes to waste. Some lies unharvested in the field. If a head is among the 85-90% chosen by the pickers, it has a 17-day shelf life, provided that it is kept cool. However, some heads are deemed imperfect and rejected before and after shipment to the distribution center, as well as before and after shipment to the supermarket. In the produce section at the store, some are damaged or spoiled before purchase. And, finally, we all know that more than a few heads of lettuce go bad in the bottom of the family fridge.

Bloom goes on to discuss the environmental impact of methane from landfills, as well as soil erosion and depletion and wasted water, energy, and resources involved in producing the 25-50% of food that never gets eaten. In terms of the family budget, as much as 25% of the food consumers purchase will eventually be thrown away, meaning that a family of four may be wasting about $2,275 per year on unneeded or unwanted food. While common sense should encourage people to value something they’ve actually paid for, there is also an ethical question. Aunt Martha was right about one thing—when some people go hungry, wasting food does seem wrong. In 2008, 15% of all Americans (including 22% of American children) didn’t have enough to eat at some point during the year. By age 18, half of all American children will have lived in a household that used public or private programs, such as food stamps or food pantries, at some point.

Bloom explores the causes of food waste in our culture, on our farms, and in our grocery stores, restaurants, and homes. The book does not present problems without offering solutions, however. You’ll find suggestions for policy-makers, institutions, and consumers on how to reduce waste at every level. For weeks after reading it, you will think about food and food waste as you plan your family meals, make your shopping lists, go to the grocery, or order from a restaurant menu. Who knows, maybe some of those new behaviors will become good habits!

Food for thought

U.S. Postal Service 2012

sustainability reportEarthscapes: seeing our world in a new way Photographs taken by NASA satellites and photographers in aircraft

Page 3 Fall 2013

During 2012, the Postal Service saved more than $52 million through its sustainability efforts and generated nearly $24 million in revenue through its recycling programs. That same year, the United States Postal Service delivered 159.86 billion pieces of mail to 152.15 million customers.

“We foster sustainable practices through employee-led ‘Lean Green’ teams that help us save money by promoting recycling and smart energy use,” reported Thomas G. Day, Chief Sustainability Officer. “Our employees share a commitment to making our operations more efficient through better resource management.”

Among other achievements, that commitment led to Lean Green teams recycling 253,908 tons of material during 2012, including undeliverable mail, cardboard, and plastic. With a 48% recycling rate, the Postal Service is on track to achieve its 50% goal by 2015.

Other environmental goals include:• Reducinggreenhousegasemissions20%by

2020• Reducingfacilityenergyuse30%by2015• Reducingwateruse10%by2015• Reducingspendingonconsumables30%by

2020• Increasingpurchasesofenvironmentally

preferable products each year• Reducingtotalpostal-vehiclepetroleumfuel

use 20% by 2015

Two of these goals, reducing facility energy use and water use, have already been achieved. By 2012, facility energy use had dropped 34% and water use had decreased by 38%. Work continues to reduce energy and water use further. The Postal Service is on track to achieve the other goals with a single exception — reducing postal-vehicle fuel use. That target remains elusive as an aging vehicle fleet serves a growing number of delivery points each year. However, the Postal Service continues to experiment with new route management techniques and other efforts to address this issue.

To increase the use of environmentally preferable products, the Postal Service has established minimum post-consumer recycled content standards for shipping and packaging materials.

The Postal Service was the first federal agency to sign up on a nationwide basis for the Federal Green Challenge, a national initiative under the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Sustainable Materials Management Program. The United States Postal Service was also the first federal agency to publicly report its greenhouse gas emissions and seek independent verification of its results.

To learn more about the Postal Service’s sustainability efforts, visit www.usps.com/green.

1,665 gallonsof gasoline.

recycling

1 ton ofaluminum cans

conserves

over

153 million btus

equivalent to

barrels of oil26

or

recycling and composting helpssave natural resources.recycling and

composting 87 million tonsof msw …

everyton of paper recycled

saved more than1.1 quadrillionbtu of energy.

of energy consumed by over

10 millionu.s. households

in a year.

can savethe energyequivalent

of

165gallonsof gasoline

that’sthe sameamount

make a difference today!if we all take small steps every day to reduce the amount of waste we produce, we can help protect our planet for generations to come.

for more information, visit www.epa.gov/recycle.

this infographic is based on data from epa’s 2011 msW characterization report. for more information, see http://1.usa.gov/usmsw.

check out http://1.usa.gov/mswinfog for the full infographic.

Greening thePostal Service

Did you know?

Page 4 Fall 2013

Only rain down the drain

When you think about leaves, grass clip-pings, and tree trimmings (collectively known as “green waste”), you probably don’t think about our beaches or ocean. But you should! When green waste is swept or blown into the street, it can clog storm drains, increasing the risk of flooding on your street. The green waste that makes its way into the storm drain system carries organic material and garden chemicals into our storm water, causing water pollution that can affect fish and other aquatic life.

Leaves, grass clippings, and tree trim-mings are collected year-round in the green or burgundy cart. These carts are picked up weekly and the green waste is reused. In the fall and early winter when you might be do-ing extra yard cleanup, San Dimas residents are allowed to place an unlimited amount of extra leaves and other yard waste out for curbside pickup. Fill your green waste cart first. Then, bag your excess leaves and yard waste. Set these bags next to your green waste cart on collection day. This program runs through January.

Follow these simple yard care tips:

• Donotoverwater. Especially during our rainy season, only water when your plants need it. If you have a sprinkler system, turn it off when it is raining or install a rain-sensor.

• Whenyoudoneedtowater,usedripirrigation, soaker hoses, or micro-spray systems to reduce water losses due to evaporation.

• Inplantingbeds,usemulchtoretainmoisture in the soil.

• Grasscycleyourclippingsbyleavingthem on the lawn when you mow. Consider backyard composting to turn your green waste into mulch or compost to be reused in your own yard. Place green waste that you cannot use into your green or burgundy cart.

• Donotbloworrakeleavesintothestreet, parkways, gutter, or storm drains.

• Useorganic,non-toxic,orslow-releasefertilizers.

• Limityouruseoffertilizerandpesticides near storm drain inlets or paved areas that can carry storm water directly to inlets.

• Pickuppetwasteanddisposeofitinthe trash cart.

We want your suggestions, questions and comments!

Waste Management SanGabriel/PomonaValley13940 E. Live Oak AvenueBaldwin Park, CA 91706

909-599-1274canderso@wm.com

www.keepingsandimasclean.com

Copyright © 2013

City of San Dimas, Waste Management SanGabriel/PomonaValley,

and Eco Partners, Inc.

All rights reserved.

Please recycle this publication after you have read it!

The right way to throw awayUsedmotoroil,paint,bugspray,andoldmedicationsshouldnotbe thrown in the trash. Items like these, which are referred to as household hazardous waste (HHW), contain chemicals that, if improperly disposed, can harm workers who handle your trash, as well as pollute the soil and water. HHW needs to be handled at special facilities where the chemicals can be properly processed and preparedforrecyclingand/orsafedisposal.

The County of Los Angeles offers FREE collection events for HHW. Electronics are also accepted. These collection events are held on Saturdays throughout the County and are open to all L.A. County residents. There is no charge to drop off HHW or electronics at these events. For upcoming event locations or more information, call 888-CLEAN-LA or go to the website, www.CleanLA.com.

For more information, please call (909) 394-6240 or visit the City’s website, www.cityofsandimas.com (at the “Public Works” tab, select “Environmental Services”).

San Dimas

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<photo: Pills & bottles>©iStockphoto.com|G.M.Vozd

<box with photo: sharps insulin pen>© iStockphoto.com | Rade Pavlovic

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Article for page 4: Length is 9”

<Paint cans>© iStockphoto.com | Ronald Bloom

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If you use a leaf blower, be sure to blow debris back onto your lawn! Please do not blow yard debris onto adjacent property or the street or into a gutter or storm drain.

City storm drains are labeled, “Do Not Dump,” to remind everyone that storm water flows directly to our streams, rivers, and ocean without treatment. Dumping anything into a storm drain violates the Federal Clean Water Act, as well as the City’s Municipal Code.

California’s new paint recycling program

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If you’ve ever done any painting around the house, you know that you almost never have exactly the right amount. Generally,youhavesomeleftoverpaint.Ifyou’velivedin the same location for several years, you probably have several partially full cans of leftover paint in an array of colors. When it was time to move or regain some storage space, the old paint usually went to household hazardous waste drop-off events, where local governments cover the cost of recycling and disposal.

In 2010, the California legislature passed a bill creating the California Architectural PaintStewardshipProgram.Underthisprogram,thepaintindustrywaschargedwithdeveloping and funding a statewide paint recycling program. The program, which is managed by PaintCare, Inc., a non-profit established by the American Coatings Association, is now up and running. Consumers can recycle paint at participating retail stores at no charge. The program is funded by fees on new paint sold.

In San Dimas, residents may drop off leftover paint at Vista Paint,173N.VillageCourt. Paint is accepted during regular business hours; call ahead to (909) 599-6803 for hoursandadditionalinformation.VistaPaintacceptslatexandoil-basedhousepaint,stains,and varnish. They will not accept aerosol paint or containers that are larger than 5 gallons, empty, leaking, or unlabeled. There is a limit of 10 gallons per visit.

To find additional paint drop-off locations near you, please visit www.paintcare.org or call (855) 724-6809.

Almost all of the components in your household batteries can be recycled andusedinmakingnewbatteries.Usedbatteries contain materials such as lead, gypsum, steel, zinc, manganese, nickel, cadmium, cobalt, and silver. These materials are needed to make new batteries, as well as many other items. Not only does reusing these materials make economic sense, but it is also good for the environment. Some of these materials can contaminate soil, water, and air when they are disposed in landfills. Because used batteries can cause pollution, it is actually illegal to dispose of them in the trash in California.

The City of San Dimas has partnered

with Waste Management to collect and recycle household batteries. There are battery collection containers at City Hall and the Senior Center. These drop-off locations accept single-use and rechargeable household batteries, including those found in electronics, but not automotive or marine batteries. For safety, please use tape to cover the positive (+) end of each of your batteries.

Batteries of all types, including automotive and marine batteries, are accepted at the Los Angeles County Household Hazardous Waste and Electronic Waste Roundup events. To find a nearby event, please visit www.CleanLA.com or call (888) CLEAN-LA.

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Pick up after your dog every time!

Purchase pet waste bags, reuse empty

plastic shopping bags, or grab a bag from the dispenser

in a local park. Then be sure to tie the

bag shut and drop it into a trash can or

your trash cart.

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