ecomaine Recycling Tagging & Education Program

Know which bin to put it in!

As residents of our community, we all have a role to play in sustainable waste management – and that includes recycling correctly.  Typically, the cost to deal with trash and recycling is one of any community’s top expenditures for the year, but poor recycling practices cost towns and their taxpayers even more. When trash ends up in your recycling bin, additional time and money are spent cleaning it out. This can amount to thousands of dollars every month.

ecomaine will be working with communities in southern Maine to conduct inspections of recycling carts placed curbside.  During these inspections, staffers will tag carts with GREEN tags for a job well done, YELLOW tags for those that need a few changes, and RED tags for contaminated bins.

The tags and information will include an explanation for the reason the item(s) do not belong in the recycling stream.  The municipalities’ haulers will not collect carts with too many unacceptable items (RED tags), and the contamination must be removed from your recycling and put into your trash before it will be collected.  Please contact ecomaine or your local public works staff for more information.

This is a project designed to prevent recycling contamination, avoid additional fees, and educate our residents about the importance of recycling correctly.  Should your cart be tagged, please feel free to contact us for guidance on how to dispose of your items.

Our staff will have materials to help you “know before you throw,” and you can request additional information through your town or ecomaine.  For more information, visit www.ecomaine.org/101, or contact us at info@ecomaine.org or 207-773-1738!



Portland Contact: Public Works, Solid Waste Division

Saco contact: Amy Oliver, Public Works Office Manager

Sanford contact: Matthew Hill, P.E., Director of Public Works & City Engineer

Scarborough contact: Jami Fitch, Sustainability Coordinator

South Portland contacts: Public Works DepartmentSustainability Department

Westbrook contact:  Lynn Leavitt, Sustainability Coordinator

Yarmouth Contact: Karen Stover, Public Works Administrative Assistant

News about this program

ecomaine expanding curbside recycling education program (WGME)

ecomaine continues curbside feedback program (Recycling Today)

Third times a charm – ecomaine tags contamination (Waste Advantage Magazine)

ecomaine ramps up curbside recycling program into more communities (WGME)

ecomaine recycling program returns in some southern Maine communities (News Center Maine)

ecomaine will roll out second phase of its recycling education program next month (Portland Press Herald)

ecomaine to start grading Mainers’ recycling bins (WGME)

Recycling outreach program returns to Scarborough this spring (Scarborough Leader)

Which Bin Does it Go in? ecomaine’s Partnership with Southern Maine Towns to Answer Recycling Questions (Waste Advantage Magazine)

ecomaine program targets residential contamination (Recycling Today)

ecomaine interns expand recycling inspections in Portland, Scarborough (News Center Maine)

ecomaine providing education on recycling to Scarborough residents (Scarborough Leader)

SoPo, Westbrook program examines recycle bins, contamination (American Journal)

Sustainable SoPo: Interns to increase awareness about the importance of proper recycling in southern Maine (South Portland Sentry)

S. Portland, Westbrook residents to be graded on recycling (News Center Maine)

Recycling ‘police’ will be watching in Scarborough and Portland (Portland Press Herald)

Maine waste company is sending interns to inspect people’s recycling bins (Bangor Daily News)

We have resources to help you learn more about which bin to put your stuff in!

By implementing this project, our hope is to decrease the amount of contamination in our recycling streams, first and foremost, in order to increase the value and amount of recycling in southern Maine.  By combining education and enforcement, we hope to inform our residents of the effect that trash in the recycling can have on our communities’ finances.  But we also hope that it will start conversations in neighborhoods about recycling, trash, and sustainability!  And ultimately, we would like to know if we can copy this model in other communities in Maine, too!

Check out our infographic recap from the 2019 pilot project!

We learned a lot from this pilot, in addition to decreasing contamination around 5%, saving an average of $4,000 per town!