The destination has changed for the paper, glass, and plastic residents of Prescott-Russell put in their blue recycling bins. New provincial recycling policies are the reason. Toronto-based Circular Materials Ontario, a not-for-profit organization, now sorts the materials collected in municipalities which are part of the Hawkesbury and Area Joint Recycling Committee, which includes the Town of Hawkesbury, Champlain Township, and the Township of East Hawkesbury. The materials collected locally are taken by truck to the Emterra HGC sorting facility in Cornwall. Previously, the recyclable items from the three committee municipalities were sorted at Recycle-Action in Hawkesbury. According to Town of Hawkesbury Project Manager Jennifer Ashfield, who also serves as the Coordinator for the Hawkesbury and Area Joint Recycling Committee, residents will not see any changes to roadside collection of recyclable materials. However, Town of Hawkesbury residents must now direct any inquiries about recycling collection, including about replacement bins, missed collection, and other recycling questions to Gilles R. Mayer Sanitation at 613-632-2582, or [email protected]. “While the recycling program is no longer managed by the municipality, rest assured that the recycling collection remains unchanged for Hawkesbury residents,” Ashfield said. The reason for the changes to who sorts the recyclables is the Ontario government’s reform of the municipal recycling program. The province is transitioning to what is called full producer responsibility.  This means producers of packaging and products (the companies that design, create and market products and packaging) will be responsible for managing and paying for the full life-cycle of their products to make recycling easier and more accessible across Ontario. The Ontario government believes full producer responsibility is the most effective and accountable way to promote waste diversion, align the cost of managing packaging and products at the end of their life, save taxpayers money, and create incentives for producers to redesign products so they are easier to recycle. Full producer responsibility for residential recycling in Ontario began taking effect on July 1. It was the latest step in the transition process which began with tires in 2018, followed by batteries in 2020, and hazardous waste and electronic waste in 2021. Residential recycling across all of Ontario will be transitioned to full producer responsibility by December 31, 2025. At Recycle-Action, full producer responsibility and the switch to Circular Materials Ontario means major changes for the business, which is a division of Groupe Convex, a social enterprise that places an emphasis on hiring people who often have barriers to employment. At its Spence Avenue facility in Hawkesbury, Recycle-Action ceased sorting residential recyclables from the Hawkesbury and Area Recycling Committee communities, and from The Nation Municipality on June 30. The facility continues to sort items from Alfred and Plantagenet and Casselman, but that will end on October 1. “We lost them,” said Recycle-Action Director of Operations Robert Lessard. He said the reason Recycle-Action has lost the residential sorting contract is because under the new provincial program, sorting contracts were allocated on a regional basis. In this case, Prescott and Russell was part of a large catchment area covering most of Eastern Ontario, including Ottawa. Recycle-Action was not permitted to bid for only part of the area. “We could not bid on a partial contract,” Lessard said. Recycle-Action remains open to its commercial customers. The Hawkesbury facility will also continue to accept cardboard, clean Styrofoam and electronic waste (e-waste). A drop-off fee of $50 per month for unlimited visits each month now applies. Lessard estimated they have 60 to 65 commercial customers. Residents may continue to leave cardboard, Styrofoam, and electronic waste free of charge. Recycle-Action has been operating in Hawkesbury for 12 years. Lessard said there are about 30 employees at the sorting facility and many have barriers to other types of employment. “Now we’ve got to reinvent ourselves,” he said. Groupe Convex is working rigorously to find new opportunities to protect the jobs of Recycle-Action employees. Lessard is confident that new sources of business may be found for Recycle-Action. Ashfield explained how under the new full producer responsibility policy, municipal properties are classified as institutions and are therefore not eligible for the blue box program. Examples of municipal properties are town halls and recreation facilities. However, the Hawkesbury and Area Joint Recycling Committee municipalities are developing a plan to ensure recyclable material continues to be collected from those properties. “We are currently gathering data about the nature and quantities of this recycling and we will concretize an action plan in September-October 2023,” Ashfield said. She added it is too soon to tell what the financial impact of the changes to recycling could be for municipalities until the action plan is developed. However, municipalities are now able to consider funding other waste diversion initiatives such as the collection of yard waste. More details are expected to be available by the end of summer, 2023.