CAN-DO ATTITUDE

PALMER — It’s difficult for Mollie Boyer to contain her excitement over the new recycling center in the Valley.

Whether she’s giving a tour of the $7 million “green” building near the Mat-Su Borough landfill, talking about the significance of Dec. 21, or peering out the classroom window to view the state-of-the-art processing area below, Boyer holds nothing back when it comes to the Valley Community for Recycling Solutions.

“It’s going to take us a few months to get it all going smoothly, but it’s already handling so much more in recyclable materials than the old site,” Boyer, the executive director, said Thursday. “It’s forcing us all to work together as a community and that’s a big step in the right direction.”

Although the new facility has been accepting recyclables from the community since mid-December, Boyer and her staff are holding the official Open House celebration Thursday at 3 p.m. in the bale storage area on the far left end of the building at 9465 E. Chanlyut Circle just off 49th State Street and the Palmer-Wasilla Highway.

The facility will not be open to take recyclables that day, Boyer stressed.

“We’re expecting somewhere between 50 and 1,000 people to attend the Open House, so it’d be difficult to tend to the visitors and handle our regular recycling duties,” Boyer explained, adding that normally the center is open Wednesdays through Fridays from noon until 6 p.m. and Saturdays from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.

The Open House will include special speakers, tours and a cake to celebrate a project that’s been about a decade in the making.

In the past few years, VCRS was able to secure $2.5 million from Mat-Su Borough, $1 million from the state and $3 million in federal funds from the U.S. Department of Community and Economic Development for the new facility designed to divert and recycle 25 percent of the waste hauled to the borough landfill.

Since then, VCRS has teamed up with Mat-Su College and local schools to help educate youngsters and the general public about the various ways recycling helps the environment and the economy.

Teachers seeking to educate students on the benefits of recycling can access a curriculum kit on the VCRS website, for example, and Mat-Su College is providing research and development assistance through its small business programs and partnerships with various companies using recycled materials.

The entire facility is insulated with recycled, essentially pulverized, newspaper known as “Mono-Therm,” Boyer pointed out, adding that the insulation comes from Thermo-Kool, a local company.

Boyer said the amount of newspaper being turned into insulation by Thermo-Kool has gone from 20 tons in 2007 to 640 tons in 2010.

And with the help of local vocational students and materials from Wal-Mart, solar panels will be installed on the facility in March as part of its goal of eventually being able to operate “off the grid” and become an emergency shelter for borough residents during power outages, she said.

Outside the building, cars were lining up to deposit plastic bottles, aluminum cans, tin cans and newspapers into the various chutes leading to large rolling bins inside.

Rebecca Cummings pulled up her SUV to empty out her periodic haul of household containers.

“I’ve been recycling for years now,” she said. “I want to keep as much out of the landfill as we can.”

For more information on the new recycling center, contact Valley Community for Recycling Solutions at 745-5544 or visit valleyrecycling.org.

Contact K.T. McKee at kate.mckee@frontiersman.com or 352-2252.