Question: I’m saddened that Hagadone Printing will be closing soon. I’ve been taking all my shredder waste, magazines, glossy mailers, junk mail, etc., for recycling at their location on Puuhale Road. How long will they be accepting paper waste? Might they keep taking it, since the whole company isn’t closing?
Answer: No. “We will no longer be taking recycling from the public,” said Clint Schroeder, president and chief operating officer of Hagadone Hawaii.
You are one of several readers who asked about Hagadone’s free paper-recycling program, which used to be open to the public on the second Saturday of every month at company headquarters on Puuhale Road near Nimitz Highway.
The final event was held Saturday, Schroeder confirmed. Hagadone Hawaii’s commercial printing division (Hagadone Printing) is scheduled to close Jan. 11, while its media and digital divisions will continue to operate.
We’ve called several companies but haven’t yet found one that recycles coated paper for free for the general public. We’ll keep trying, and publish any helpful information.
The city’s Department of Environmental Services says glossy paper such as magazines, inserts and mailers should be treated as general household rubbish; if you’re on a three-cart route, that means placing it in the gray cart.
Rubbish in the gray cart is burned at Oahu’s HPOWER waste-to-energy plant, producing electricity that is sold to Hawaiian Electric Co., the department explains on its website, opala.org.
Up to 10 percent of Oahu’s electricity is produced by incinerating garbage, it says. “This is why low-grade, low-value papers and plastics go into your gray cart.”
Q: You mentioned that ag burning is permitted, does that mean any ag operation can burn?
A: No, it means that an agricultural operation must hold a valid permit in order to burn. “Anyone engaged in an agricultural operation is prohibited from causing or allowing agricultural burning without a permit from the Department of Health. The main requirements for agricultural burning, permits and fees appear in HAR Section 11-60.1-51 to -57, and Section 11-60.1-121,” according to the website of the department’s Clean Air Branch, 808ne.ws/cab.
Your question was inspired by Wednesday’s column, which answered a reader’s question about backyard burning of household garbage; that’s been prohibited on all islands since 2012.
Q: We moved and no longer have the three carts (black, blue and green) for trash and recycling. Is the Christmas pickup different?
A: There is no Christmas pickup, on either the city’s three-cart curbside recycling routes or on its manual collection routes. Christmas and New Year’s Day are the two days the city doesn’t collect garbage, mixed recyclables or green waste.
Now that you are on a manual route, if your twice-weekly garbage pickup falls on Christmas or New Year’s Day, hold your rubbish for your next scheduled collection day, according to the city.
For people on the three-cart routes, what to do depends on which cart is affected by the holiday. If it’s the black cart (general refuse), leave it at the curb because the missed collection will be made up within a day or two, the city says. If it’s the blue cart (mixed recyclables) or green cart (yard trimmings), don’t put the cart at the curb because those collections aren’t made up; hold the blue or green cart for the next scheduled pickup.
Mahalo
Christmas cheers to the kindhearted person who turned in my handbag, which I had absentmindedly left in the cart at Pearl City Longs on Dec. 10. — Much appreciation, Karen
Write to Kokua Line at Honolulu Star-Advertiser, 7 Waterfront Plaza, Suite 210, 500 Ala Moana Blvd., Honolulu 96813; call 529-4773; fax 529-4750; or email kokualine@staradvertiser.com.
