{"id":32533,"date":"2026-01-21T16:16:55","date_gmt":"2026-01-21T21:16:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/?p=32533"},"modified":"2026-01-21T16:16:56","modified_gmt":"2026-01-21T21:16:56","slug":"recycle-dropoff-site-abuse-causes-closings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/2026\/01\/21\/recycle-dropoff-site-abuse-causes-closings\/","title":{"rendered":"Recycle dropoff site abuse causes closings"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><strong>By BOB SHRALUKA<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>WZBD.com<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Blatant abuse of its Elm St. recycling dropoff site is causing the City of Decatur to curtail hours the site will be open.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>People are throwing their trash into the recycle dumpsters, city Street\/Sanitation Superintendent Matt Schultz told city council at its Tuesday night meeting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It&#8217;s become not only an increasingly difficult situation to deal with, but it&#8217;s costing the city money.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"518\" height=\"131\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wzbd.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/Recycle-dumpster.jpg?resize=518%2C131&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-32534\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wzbd.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/Recycle-dumpster.jpg?w=518&amp;ssl=1 518w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wzbd.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/Recycle-dumpster.jpg?resize=300%2C76&amp;ssl=1 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 518px) 100vw, 518px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cWeekends have been really rough,\u201d Schultz explained.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Trash is being placed in the dumpsters, along with items for recycling. cardboard and the like. So city employees have to spend time removing the trash or it goes to the recycling site in Fort Wayne.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cWe have to pay (to have the recyclables) taken (by a Fort Wayne firm),\u201dMayor Dan Rickord said. \u201cSo it&#8217;s being abused and city residents are paying for it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>People who don&#8217;t live in the city are among those dumping trash, it was pointed out.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>There are cameras at the dropoff site, but they are only mildly helpful in curbing the abuse.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Schultz proposed and council agreed to close down the Elm St. site on Friday through Sunday each week. \u201cWe can monitor it much better during the week,\u201d Schultz said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cIt&#8217;s a great service that&#8217;s being abused. It could go away,\u201d Councilman Matt Dyer warned.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By BOB SHRALUKA WZBD.com Blatant abuse of its Elm St. recycling dropoff site is causing the City of<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[14,15,21],"class_list":["post-32533","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news","tag-decatur","tag-featured","tag-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32533","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32533"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32533\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32535,"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32533\/revisions\/32535"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32533"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32533"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wzbd.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32533"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}