Monthly Plastics Recycling Program

WHERE: The parking lot of the Bank Street School at the corner of Bank St and Leighton Rd

WHEN: Once a month, on the second Saturday from 10:00am to noon 

NEXT DATE: April 13, 2024

HOW: Our volunteers collect recycling for ReFuse once a month. Please follow the 3 steps below before you drop off.

 

Payment is by donation. Please bring sufficient change, ie loonies & toonies, or small bills to cover your donation to minimize the need to make change when you pay.

Know Before You Go:

To help speed things along on recycling day, please review the following instructions:

  • In order to accommodate social distancing and lineups, please allow yourself extra time to recycle.
  • Sort your recycling material into the separate categories before leaving home. Make sure your plastic is CLEAN. Dirty plastic can’t be recycled.
  • When attending the SJNA plastic recycling area, you’ll note the pavement is clearly marked to guide the traffic flow. Please follow the signage.

 

Review list of acceptable items (below)

The CRD program (blue box at home) currently takes hard plastics, tetrapaks, gable top cartons and paper cups.

Make sure your plastic is CLEAN.

Dirty plastic can’t be recycled.

Sort your recycling material into separate categories BEFORE coming to recycle.

This is the list of what’s acceptable for our South Jubilee plastic recycling program:

Accepted Items:

  • Hard plastic
  • Soft plastic (NO MESH BAGS)
  • WHITE only Styrofoam food containers including WHITE meat trays, etc. Containers can be stained but must be clean.
  • Styrofoam packing
  • Styrofoam peanuts
  • Gable top cartons
  • Tetra paks
  • Foil-lined bags (e.g. chip bags, coffee bags)
  • Mixed paper (e.g. take-out coffee cups)
  • Refundable bottles and cans – Milk and milk substitute packaging is now refundable
  • Batteries
  • Electronics/small appliances (CDs, DVDs, video and audio tapes are now considered electronics)
  • Most types of lightbulbs
  • Most milk and milk-substitute containers are now refundable. This includes all ready-to-drink milk and milk substitutes (almond, soy, oat, etc.)
    EXCLUDED: cream/whipping cream, yogurt drinks, meal substitutes, infant formula

 

About SJNA’s Recycling Program

Roger Smeeth, recycler extraordinaire and South Jubilee resident, is the driving force behind our neighbourhood’s plastic recycling program. The program he began has become the model for neighbourhood plastic recycling in other communities in Victoria.

It all began back in 1997, when Roger heard of Chris Mowat and his dogged efforts to gather plastic and take it to a Vancouver plant for reprocessing into “super wood”. Roger convinced Chris to try a pilot project in South Jubilee where residents would bring their plastic to his truck at the Victoria College of Art parking lot one Saturday per month. The first day there were 54 residents with their plastic. The word got out and soon individuals from other neighbourhoods were turning up at our monthly collections. Early in 1999 and based on the South Jubilee model, Fairfield organized its own process at five locations in their neighbourhood. They were soon followed by James Bay, Saanich and later, Oaklands.

We now deal with ReFuse Resource Recovery who come at the end of our recycling to pick up all the plastic collected. This program takes almost all types of plastics, styrofoam, electronics, and much more. The CRD program (blue box) currently takes hard plastics, tetrapaks, gable top cartons and paper cups. Our neighbourhood association pays ReFuse, our recycling partner, by the number of 36″ X 48″ bags we collect.