Mississippi State University and the City of Starkville are evaluating a possible cooperative recycling program. The city recently suspended its recycling program after incurring increased contractor costs for recycling services. Saunders Ramsey, MSU’s executive director of Campus Services, said Starkville officials reached out to the university about a potential recycling partnership through Waste Pro. Ramsey said the university has a long history of effective collaboration with the city, but a recycling partnership would require some structure to make the proposal financially feasible.
Starkville Mayor Lynn Spruill told the MSU student newspaper, The Reflector, in August: “At this point in time, we have gone from drop-off recycling to curbside recycling to drop-off recycling again due to the pandemic, and we are now going to suspend traditional recycling in its entirety. It has gotten to the point now where there is very little to no market for recyclables. Those who have taken our recyclables have cut back dramatically on the types of things they will accept. So, it now costs us about $40,000 a year to recycle, with no understanding of whether the items are actually getting recycled.”
“The building blocks of a successful partnership from MSU’s perspective would be location, control of the site, cost, and education,” said Ramsey.