SELMA, Ore. -- Some crew members helping out with the Klondike Fire are turning trash to cash by recycling fire camp bottles, paper, and cardboard. This group from Bend scours tents for recyclable materials everyday and utilizes 50 receptacles that they distributed across the camp.
The team then separates plastic bottles and cans from the paper to return to an Oregon Bottle Drop redemption center where they receive money back for each container.
Since August 2nd, the group has recycled almost 125 thousand water bottles and cans for a return of $12 thousand to be used for local forest fire suppression through the U.S. Forest Service-Rogue River-Siskiyou National Forest.
“Recycling is simply the right thing to do,” says recycling coordinator Jason Shurmur. “We’re helping change the footprint in this community. If we weren’t here all those recyclables would end up in the local landfill.”
