FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — The City of Fayetteville was named a 2022 Program of the Year by Resource Recycling for its Recycling and Trash Collection Division’s efforts in recycling, food-waste diversion and education.

Fayetteville was named the winner of the Small City category, while Washington, D.C., was named the Large City winner. This is the second year for the awards by Resource Recycling, which is headquartered in Portland, Ore. Other finalists for the Small City category were Marquette County, Mich., and San Marcos, Texas.

“Fayetteville has gone above and beyond to help residents and businesses divert their food scraps from [the] landfill, even handing out free collection buckets and setting up numerous drop-off centers,” Resource Recycling said in a media release. “The city also conducts robust outreach through multiple avenues.”

Fayetteville will be honored at the 2022 Resource Recycling Conference, the only national event dedicated to enhancing municipal recycling. The conference will be held Aug. 15-17 in Austin, Texas.

Recycling and Trash Collection collects from nearly 16,600 houses, as well as apartment units and commercial establishments. In 2021, about 6,570 tons of recyclables, 876 tons of food scraps and 17 tons of household hazardous waste were collected from homes and businesses in the Fayetteville. Overall, Fayetteville has a 19% recycling rate, with a contamination rate of less than 2%.

To read the Resource Recycling media release announcing the winners, go to: https://resource-recycling.com/recycling/2022/08/03/two-cities-nab-awards-for-program-excellence/.

To learn more about the City’s Trash and Recycling Collection efforts – including the only city-run residential food-waste program in the state of Arkansas – go to: https://www.fayetteville-ar.gov/4085/Trash-and-Recycling.