CVP, Solid Waste Agency of Lake County Partner on Education Effort

The Curbside Value Partnership (CVP), Arlington, Va., has announced the creation of a partnership with the Solid Waste Agency of Lake County (SWALCO), Gurnee, Ill. The partnership, the CVP’s latest, will look at steps to increase recycling in Lake County, Ill., beginning this fall.

CVP is a national, invitation-only program designed to help communities grow their curbside programs through education. Since 2005, CVP has partnered with 29 communities and four states to develop, execute and measure education campaigns.

SWALCO is a municipal joint action agency that serves 41 municipalities, including the Lake County and Naval Station Great Lakes, which includes about 230,000 households.

“CVP and SWALCO are looking forward to helping consumers get more material into their recycling containers,” says Craig Cookson, CVP board member and director of sustainability and recycling, plastics division, for the American Chemistry Council. “Many Lake County residents are already doing a great job, and we want to help them understand how they can do even better.”

As part of the partnership with CVP, SWALCO and its members will implement and measure a grassroots education campaign that is designed to increase awareness for curbside recycling, grow participation and boost volume levels. The campaign is expected to launch this fall with planning already under way. Education tactics for the campaign are expected to include marketing, an enhanced Web and social media presence, advertising, public relations and grassroots, community-level outreach. SWALCO will measure the impact of the campaign through its Emerge Knowledge Re-TRAC Connect data management tool.

“SWALCO is proud to partner with CVP for this important education campaign,” says Walter Willis, SWALCO’s executive director. “We’re particularly interested in collaborating on an effective education campaign that will help us hit the 60 percent diversion goal we set for ourselves in our strategic plan.”

“We know that recycling is important in Lake County and that it is a community with a history of support for conservation and sustainability, at all levels, including the County Board and local elected officials, some of whom are even involved in developing our campaign,” says Steve Thompson, CVP executive director. “Despite this supportive environment, there is still tremendous headroom for recycling. We want to help SWALCO’s members capture that headroom and educate their residents about all of the things they can recycle so they can do better.”

Officials plan to launch the campaign this fall, and CVP will promote best practices gleaned from the effort to communities across the country via its website and its new online training tool, CVP Connect .