As spring approaches, many of us are beginning to consider our plans for spring cleaning, relocating or tidying up around our shops and garages. As residents sort through items in their homes, we aim to provide guidance on the best ways to dispose of items that are no longer wanted or needed.

While it is important that residents and businesses recognize what personal responsibility you may have in understanding where items should be directed, residents in Lyon County may not always be familiar with where to bring items once they are ready for disposal. Residents can contract the Lyon County Environmental Department, the Lyon County Landfill, or their local waste hauler for specific information.

To further assistance residents, we recently mailed a flyer outlining the proper disposal methods for the most frequently asked items at the Environmental Department. If you did not receive a copy, please reach out and we will be happy to send one to you. To further assist, please remember that any empty containers such as paint containers, cleaner containers, oil containers or yard and garden containers that are empty can be thrown away. If you have paint that is dried up and looks like an old hockey puck, these, too, can be thrown away. They are not recyclable. Please remember: Do not leave any items outside the Household Hazardous Waste Facility after hours.

Yes, there is a price tag for disposing of some items; the fee for covering the cost of disposal of certain items is quite low. The Lyon County Landfill will accept trash directly from residents for a low cost fee. There is no fee associated with items such as paint, lawn and garden chemicals and many other items that come to the Household Hazardous Waste Facility.

Rigid Styrofoam can be dropped off at the Household Hazardous Waste facility for free recycling but should not be placed in curbside carts or community drop sites. Rigid Styrofoam must come inside the facility during business hours. It can be thrown away into your own trash if you so desire to go that route. Rigid Styrofoam and plastic shopping bags are the number one and two items that are not recyclable that we see in recycling at this time.

A recycling flyer will also be forthcoming, so please be on the lookout for this important information. It is essential to note that recycling drop-off sites throughout the county are designated solely for recyclables, not for trash. Lyon County does not provide any public trash containers.

Please remember that not all plastic items are recyclable; in fact, very few are. Our upcoming recycling flyer will include a specific list of what items can be recycled and what cannot be recycled. Do not rely solely on the recycling symbol, triangles with numbers within them or claims on packaging, as these are often misleading and may result in non-recyclable items being included in the recycling stream. If the item is not paper, flattened cardboard or an empty, clean food container, it cannot be placed into recycling.

It may seem like there is not a whole lot that can be recycled as far as what can go into our recycling carts or community recycling dropsites. Paper, flattened cardboard and clean, empty food container are about it. Remember the three “R’s” — we are asked to Reduce our waste first, Reuse what we can and Recycle what is left over.

The Minnesota Legislature passed the Packaging Waste and Cost Reduction Act and with that passing we may see some changes with packaging within the next 5 years. This act created something called the Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) program. The EPR program will hold those who make or produce packaging more responsible for their packaging. This will help the packaging producers to either modify their packaging so that it is accepted as recyclable, refillable, reusable or compostable by 2032. Stay tuned for updates.

For more information, please contact the Lyon County Environmental Department at (507) 532-8210 or the Lyon County Landfill at (507) 865-4615.