Columbia to resume curbside recycling in March

COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)

The City of Columbia will resume curbside recycling services next month, ending about 10 months during which pickup was suspended.

The city said in a news release that curbside residential pickup will resume on an every-other-week basis on March 18.

"We are excited to be resuming this service within weeks of the implementation of our automated trash collection system," City Manager De’Carlon Seewood said in the release. "The City will be sharing information and reminders regarding routes and other pertinent details related to service resumption ahead of March 18."

Utilities Director Dave Sorrell said previously that staffing needed to be at 90% for the service to resume. Utilities spokesman Matt Nestor said Friday that the city needs to hire at least three or four more employees to reach that level.

However, he noted the city will utilize temporary workers, and possibly staff from trash pickup to help.

"I believe we're three or four away from reaching that mark," Nestor said. "We have four new hires who are coming in who will begin training here in the next week or so, but we think we uh we can use temporary workers to come in and fill our needs."

Nestor said the city is still actively working on hiring more employees. He told ABC17 News on Wednesday that seven total new workers had been hired.

Shauna and Aaron Miller live in Columbia with their two children and said they constantly have loads of boxes from Amazon deliveries in their home. The two said they believe bringing the service back will help eliminate the need to have to go to public recycling centers in the city, which are frequently overflowing.

"I mean, it (bringing recycling to a drop-off center) definitely does add to the list of things that you have to do," Shauna Miller said. "And, sometimes it's just easier to throw it in the garbage you know, and I think that having a system in place that eliminates those obstacles makes it a lot more reasonable."

The city will start its new automated trash pickup service next month, as well.

Nestor said residents should expect an email with the collection schedule to come within the coming weeks, though he doesn't expect routes to change.