NEWS RELEASE

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE November 14, 2000

CARY, NC – It’s life after life for computers in Cary. Continuing with its pledge to lead the State in preserving and protecting the environment, the Town of Cary begins appointment-based curbside collection of broken computers starting Monday, November 20^th, a full month earlier than staff projected in October. Citizens who have non-working computers should call the Town at 469-4090 as soon as possible to arrange for collection. Citizens with outdated but still working computers will be referred to non-profit agencies that can put them to good use, including Goodwill Industries, the Computer Exchange, Explornet, and the Disabled American Veterans.

"Being very aware of the popularity of getting new computers as gifts, we worked aggressively to have an efficient, economical, and environmentally friendly computer recycling program in place before the holidays," said Town of Cary Public Works Director Mike Bajorek.

Cary began examining the viability computer recycling several months ago based on comments from citizens and Town Council members. The Town this month signed a contract with Chatham Salvage of Bear Creek, NC to take ITS computers for recycling. Because of the complexities of dealing with monitors, Chatham Salvage is charging the Town $4.00 per monitor that is collected. This charge, however, is not being passed on to citizens at this time.

In 1998, over 20 million personal computers became obsolete in the United States, according to the National Safety Council. About half a million of these were In Triangle homes, and with the thought that these units will becomes obsolete in five years, area governments will have to deal with them by 2002, either through disposal in the landfill or through recycling.

"Dealing appropriately with these large volume complex materials—including finding good markets for resale—is a real challenge in the field of solid waste management." said Cary’s new Recycling & Solid Waste Specialist Karen Hales. "Our goal for the computer recycling initiative is to reduce the amount of computers going into the landfill, reuse the computers that can be reused, and recycle the different components of the rest."

Last year, the Town of Cary diverted over 16,000 tons of waste from the landfill, 7,000 tons of which came from the curbside collection of 16 types of recyclables.

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