JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – A group of Fletcher High School students took charge of protecting the environment Sunday by setting up a temporary recycling drop-off site at Huffman Boulevard Park. This comes as the city’s curbside pickup for recycling is suspended so more workers can focus on current garbage issues.
The pop-up site saved people like Hillary Siragusa a trip to one of the city’s 15 designated drop-off sites. She says it would have been at least 10 minutes out of the way.
“They are doing something really great,” Siragusa said. They are providing a service to me and to our environment. They are taking some responsibility. They saw that there was a problem, I assume, and stepped in to provide a solution.”
The group known as Co2nsequences Incorporated, which is both an organization at their school and non-profit, is helping fill the void as curbside pickup in the River City is on hold indefinitely.
“It shows me that people still care,” said Grant Tucker, the president and founder of Co2nsequences Inc. “I know that in these trying times some more things become important [than recycling].”
Carly Young is the vice president. They say they wanted to give people the chance to help the environment and felt the Huffman Boulevard Park area needs another option.
“A lot of the recycling right now is being put in the trash and it’s not good,” Young said.
To avoid that for at least one day, these students set up shop at the park.
They said plans moving forward include using a truck to pick up recycling from people’s houses.
“With climate change being such a present issue in our society today, it is important that we remember that recycling is one of the main beneficial factors in reducing our climate impact,” Tucker said.
“We thought if people can at least come and get it to us, we can go and drop it off at the recycling spot,” Young said.
After two hours of collecting recycling, the students took everything to Girvin Road Landfill, which is about 15 minutes away. That is one of the 15 drop-off sites the city set up.