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East Cape Recycling Baja is a community-based initiative sponsored
by UVERDE,
a non-profit association. We have had an amazing year! As we near
the end of
the season, we want to share our accomplishments and enlist your
help in
meeting some of our challenges.
THE MISSION OF EAST CAPE RECYCLING BAJA
The mission of East Cape Recycling Baja is to help our community
reduce, reuse
and recycle all disposable materials. This is a BIG job in any
country, but in
Mexico it is especially challenging! Currently, East Cape Recycling
Baja is run by
three energetic women who are committed to this community and to the
benefits that recycling has on our lives, our community, our culture
and our
countries. We believe with enthusiastic volunteers who share our
passion and
“imagine” a green world, we can make our Baja home a better place to
live and
preserve its precious beauty. Ultimately, with education and
demonstration, we
can teach the future generations how to care for their environment.
OUR SHORT HISTORY
Our program began in November 2009 with a true grassroots program to
collect and transport acceptable recycles from Los Barriles to a new
San
Jose/Cabo San Lucas organization called “Yo Reciclo”. We contracted
a truck
and driver to drop the recyclables off at the nearest drop-off point
in San Jose.
(There are eight additional Yo Reciclo drop-off points in Cabo.) For
many
months we paid an additional fee to a vendor in San Jose just to
accept our
glass each month. Recycling glass, which we gather in significant
quantities,
remains a constant challenge.
For most of us recycling is familiar and part of our lifestyles in
the United States
and Canada, but in Mexico it is a new paradigm. Unfortunately, there
is no
central “RECYCLE CENTER” in Baja where everything gets processed.
The
vendors are spread throughout San Jose, Cabo San Lucas and La Paz,
each
accepting various materials to process and send north to the United
States, the
Mexico mainland and beyond (even to China!). Many vendors are trying
to
make their living through recycling; try as they may, they face many
challenges
and often the businesses come and go, making our recycling job more
difficult.
In January 2012, after months of searching, we identified a vendor
in San Jose
who purchases sorted plastics, aluminum and cardboard. While the
sale of
recyclables provides a nominal amount of income for East Cape
Recycling Baja,
combined with our monthly contributions and special fundraising
efforts it
motivates us to move forward and expand our efforts. We have many
goals and
“imagine” a bright future for our GREEN ideas!
FUNDING
We operate on a bare bones, shoestring budget. Recycle Day
Donations, Vendor
Purchases and Fundraising Events provide just enough income to cover
our
expenses. To accomplish new projects or initiatives additional
fundraising is
required.
RECYCLE DAY DONATIONS
To pay for a driver and gasoline to delivery our recyclables ($1500
pesos/
$120 usd) each month, initially we asked our recycling community to
donate
$50.00 pesos each month along with their recyclables. With the
increased cost
of fuel, and expenses relating to our new center and recycling
projects, we
increased our request to $70.00 pesos, which is equal to
approximately $5.00
usd each month. These donations are often sufficient to pay for
delivery of our
recyclables, but some months we must allocate other income to cover
the cost.
VENDOR PURCHASES
We are now able to sell some of our recyclables (sorted plastic,
aluminum,
cardboard) to vendors, and these sales generate approximately $500
pesos/
$40.00 usd each month. Although meager, this income is welcome, and
helps
us advance our efforts to keep recyclable goods out of the landfill
and helps us
assure a greener future.
MUSIC EVENTS
Two wonderful fundraising music events have been held poolside at
the East
Cape Casas & RV Resort. Our first event in the fall of 2010 was a
concert under
the stars with Miguel de Hoyos and Alex DePue. The second, this
winter, was a
dance concert with Los Viejos. Both were important fundraising
events to help
us reach our goals of building the recycling center, purchasing the
trailer, and
cover signage costs.
POOLSIDE MOVIE NIGHT
To meet the needs of entertainment hungry moviegoers, we have hosted
four
movie nights, poolside under the stars. It’s a fun community get
together and
adds to our coffers.
OUR SPONSORS
Although we are immensely proud of our newly constructed center, our
sorting
bins, our event recycling system, and our new trailer, these capital
improvements and purchases have left us in debt. We are very lucky
to have
supporters who have advanced the costs of these projects and other
operating
expenses and have been willing to wait, while we raise money, to be
reimbursed.
WE HAVE COME A LONG WAY THIS SEASON!
NEW RECYCLING CENTER
We have a home! Through a generous donation by Theresa Comber and
Shaun
Speer of property adjacent to their East Cape Casas & RV Resort, we
no longer
have to set up our recycling day collection on the highway. The
Recycling
Center is now conveniently located in the heart of Los Barriles,
across from the
Modelorama, with easy access from Boulevard November 20. Theresa and
Shaun also advanced the funds, $25,100 pesos/$2,000 usd, to
construct
concrete bins to separate plastic, glass, cardboard and aluminum,
with clear
instruction signage painted in both English and Spanish. To further
simplify the
sorting process, we built individual sorting containers for clear
plastic, opaque
plastic, colored plastic and aluminum. Unlike in the US and Canada,
Mexican
recycling vendors require plastic recyclables to be sorted.
AN IDENTIFIABLE NEW NAME AND LOGO
We have a name and logo and we hope you like it! In January of 2012
we
established an identifiable name - East Cape Recycling Baja - with a
logo that
is now on our banner, letterhead (at the top of this report),
reusable
grocery/multi-purpose bags, recycling crates and Recycling Center.
NEW TRAILER
The good news is, so many in our community have embraced recycling
that
every month, we now transport to San Jose between 4 - 8 huge bags
(3’ x 3’ x
6’) of plastic and aluminum, bundled cardboard and boxes of glass.
We
explored various options for transporting our recyclables, including
borrowing
trailers, but quickly realized in order to have reliable equipment
for
transportation we needed to acquire a trailer. Fortuitously one of
our
supporters, Ralph and Brenda Urwin had an excellent trailer that
they sold to
East Cape Recycling Baja ($21,250 pesos/$1700 usd), and are
accepting
payment over time. Although this acquisition came late in the
season, we have
already put it to good use hauling glass to the glass blowers in San
Jose who
recycle clear glass.
NEW RECYCLING SERVICES
East Cape Recycling Baja was approached by the newly formed Saturday
Community Market to provide a recycling station and soon thereafter
East Cape
Arts Association (Asociacion de Artes del Mar de Cortez A.C.) asked
us to
provide recycling services at the Arts Festival in April. We are so
excited that
our community is embracing recycling and we grabbed these
opportunities to
provide service, as it is exactly within our mission to make the
East Cape
GREEN and preserve its special beauty.
East Cape Recycling Baja purchased eight sets of portable crates and
the
needed signage to create recycling stations for plastic and
aluminum. With this
equipment, we are now ready to provide recycle stations around food
courts
and other areas for all events in Los Barriles. We look forward to
working with
Rotary, Lord of the Winds, the Guild, ALMA, East Cape Arts
Association, the
Community Market and other groups for their recycling needs, as well
as to
reduce the use of Styrofoam, use recycled and biodegradable
tableware for their
food service, and to recycle plastic and aluminum at all community
events.
NEW PRODUCTS FOR SALE
To help with the fundraising effort, and to promote our mission to
‘reduce,
reuse and recycle’ we are pleased to offer recycled and recycling
products.
Reusable Grocery Bags
Featuring the East Cape Recycling Baja logo and made in part with
recycled
materials, we now have large and sturdy Reusable
Grocery/Multi-purpose Bags
for sale, for just $40.00 pesos each. These Reusable Bags make
reducing the
use of the non-biodegradable plastic grocery bags easy. We are very
excited
that several local Mexican and Gringo merchants are selling our
Reusable Bags
in their establishment with no additional mark-up! A big thank you
goes to:
Blue Wave Natural Foods, East Cape Casas and RV Resort, East Cape
Vacation
Rentals, and Jose’s Deli.
Recycle Sorting Bags
To help make in-home recycling easy, we offer for sale sets of
Recycle Sorting
Bags. These large, washable, heavy duty, color coded bags, stand up
and Velcro
together for a convenient means to crush and sort plastic, aluminum,
glass and
cardboard, and are easy to transport on Recycling Day! Recycle
Sorting Bags (set
of 4) cost $330.00 pesos, are available at the East Cape Casas and
RV Resort,
and by contacting Lynn Mirassou at
lynnmirassou@gmail.com
or Holly Burgin at
burgin.holly@gmail.com .
Recycled Hand Blown Glassware
True to our mission to ‘recycle and reuse’, the clear glass
collected at the East
Cape Recycling Baja center is delivered to a glass blower in San
Jose who reuses
the glass to make hand blown glassware, stemware and decorative
glass items.
East Cape Recycling Baja receives a credit from the glass blower for
the clear
glass we recycle. We used our credit to acquire hand blown glass
items that we
sold at our booth at the April Arts Festival. The recycled hand
blown glass
items were a huge hit and sold out with requests for more!
The sale of each of these products generates a small portion of our
cash flow,
and together with Movie Night, Music and other fundraising events
help East
Cape Recycling Baja become financially stable. Since we still have
outstanding
liabilities, we must continue to fundraise to become solvent.
WE HAVE AMAZING VOLUNTEERS!
East Cape Recycling Baja could not have made the giant leaps this
season
without the immense help of terrific volunteers. It is remarkable
what can be
accomplished when people volunteer!
As our community has responded with such enthusiasm to help our
recycling
program grow, the many hands of our volunteers on recycling day has
made
light work of a huge job of crushing, sorting and loading the
recyclables for
delivery to San Jose.
Our continued growth means we need more volunteers on recycling day.
Could
it be you? Our motto is ‘Just One Hour - Once a Month.’ In addition
to recycling
day, to underscore our current commitments and to expand our program
we
are also looking for volunteers to assist us with various East Cape
Recycling
Baja projects.
Events Coordinator and Volunteers Needed
In order to offer Recycling Services at community events, East Cape
Recycling
Baja needs Volunteers who will set up, monitor, and retrieve the
Recycling
Crates and recycled material at local events. With a Team of
Volunteers, the
Coordinator will have an easy time making assignments, so that each
person
can volunteer for only one hour a month.
Glass Coordinator and Volunteers Needed
We have the opportunity to sell the recycled hand blown glassware at
the
Community Market and the Art Festivals.
We need a Coordinator to work with Volunteers to select and manage
the
glassware from the glass blower in San Jose, and Volunteers who will
setup the
East Cape Recycling Baja booth and sell the hand blown glass at the
Community
Market (two times a month) and at the Art Festival (two times a
year).
‘Just say NO to Styrofoam’ Coordinator and Volunteers Needed
Although our ‘Just say NO to Styrofoam’ program is only “imagined”
at this
point (see WHAT IS HAPPENING NEXT below), East Cape Recycling Baja
needs a
Coordinator and Volunteers to spearhead this effort. We have many
ideas on
how to tackle this challenge, but we need Volunteers who can help
develop our
strategy and implement our program.
The Event Services, Glass and ‘Just say NO to Styrofoam’ programs
are all
projects where many hands make light work. So if you can volunteer
one hour
a month, we would love for you to be on one of our Volunteer Teams.
If you
take a leadership role as a Coordinator, your talents will make a
significant
contribution to making the East Cape GREEN.
Truck and Driver Needed
The collection of $70 pesos each month from each family that uses
the
recycling center goes a long way to covering the cost of gasoline
and to
compensate the driver to weigh, load and deliver recyclables to
various
locations in San Jose. But we can reduce this expense.
We need a Volunteer Driver with a pickup truck (and trailer hitch),
who will
use our trailer to deliver our recyclables to various locations in
San Jose on the
first Thursday of each month. With this very generous help and
support, we can
reallocate approximately $1,000 pesos each month to work on new,
effective
initiatives and cover other expenses. East Cape Recycling Baja will
happily pay
for your gas!
WHAT IS HAPPENING NEXT?
There is much more to do to help our community reduce, reuse and
recycle all
disposable materials.
Commercial Recycling
In addition to encouraging more residential recycling, we know that
our local
merchants and restaurants send tons of recyclable materials to the
dump every
month. East Cape Recycling Baja will reach out to the local
merchants and
restaurants to participate in our recycling program.
‘Just say NO to Styrofoam’
Polystyrene, known as Styrofoam, is toxic waste that fills up to 30%
of landfills
and takes 500 years to decompose. It is not recyclable and is not
biodegradable. Styrene leaches into the foods that are served in
Styrofoam.
Styrofoam is often dumped into the environment as litter. This
material is
notorious for breaking up into pieces that choke animals and fish
which clogs
their digestive systems.
East Cape Recycling Baja is researching affordable alternative
biodegradable
beverage cups, plates and take-out containers for our local
restaurants and
taquerias. We will initiate a ‘Just Say NO To Styrofoam’ campaign to
end the
use of Styrofoam in Los Barriles, by educating the community as to
the impact
and danger of Styrofoam on the environment, and methods to encourage
merchants to use alternative biodegradable products.
Recycle Expanded Polystyrene (EPS6)
Not to be confused with Styrofoam, we now accepts Expanded
Polystyrene 6,
known as EPS No.6, and hope that you will begin saving it and
bringing it with
your other recyclables.
EPS No. 6 is white foam commonly used to package TV's, home
appliances,
computers, etc. It is composed of white beads compressed together.
If you
break up EPS No. 6, unlike Styrofoam, it becomes little round
pieces/beads.
Some of the foam will be marked with the recycle symbol with a 6
inside it.
Or, it may say EPS6.
EPS No.6 takes up a lot of space in landfills and is extremely toxic
to burn in
open fires. The good news is, unlike Styrofoam, EPS No. 6 can be
recycled and
reused. A local construction company, in La Ventana, BCS, Eco Design
and
Build of Mexico ecodesignbuildmexico.com, recycles this type of foam
to make
a durable, fire-resistant and highly insulative block for home
building.
Please bring EPS No. 6 to the Recycle Center. If we can gather a
truck load, Eco
Design & Build of Mexico will come to Los Barriles and pick it up.
THANK YOU LOS BARRILES!
Thanks for taking the time to read about East Cape Recycling Baja
and our
journey. Thanks to everyone in our community who is committed to
reduce,
reuse and recycle. Please encourage your friends and neighbors to
participate in
the recycling program. We have come a long way since our grassroots
beginning in November 2009. With your support, East Cape Recycling
Baja is
helping to make recycling in Mexico a cultural reality, now and for
future
generations.
Lynn Mirassou
lynnmirassou@gmail.com
Theresa Comber
combertheresa@hotmail.com
Holly Burgin
burgin.holly@gmail.com
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