In late May, I saw that the City of Boston was launching a curbside food waste collection program or a household composting program. When I was a teenager, my mother did composting for her garden, and I’ve always wished I could do composting in my apartments. There is an independent program in Boston called Boostrap Compost, but since I’m on a fixed income, the monthly charges were more than my budget could fit.
When I saw the City of Boston was starting its own program, I registered immediately. There’s no charge to participate, and they provide you with everything you need to get started. The starter kit contains
- A wheeled bucket to put out on trash day
- A smaller bucket for your kitchen
- A roll of compostable liners for your kitchen tub
- A guidebook to help you know what you can put in the tub
- And a handy magnet to put on your refrigerator you can check you make sure you’re only putting acceptable items in your tubs.
If you already do recycling with your eligible trash, you’ll find that some recyclables, like paper towels and toilet tissue cores, can go into your compost tube. If your grocery store has compostable bags for their produce, you can use those to put compostable items in. When you run out of bin liners, you can use a double-lined paper bag or any BPI, CMA, or OK Compost certified compostable bin liners. It’s all in the guidebook, and you can also check the FAQ page for more information on the program.
They’ll start collecting food waste the week of 1 August, and it will be picked up on your regular trash day. If you have multiple trash pickups every week, they’ll pick up your food waste on the first pickup of the week. Not every neighborhood in Boston is participating yet, and the first step of signing up is to make sure your neighborhood is eligible.
If you want to get some of the compost produced by the program for your garden, you can purchase bags of compost. I’m going to look into doing that when I finally start doing more gardening than the five pots of plants that live on my back porch.
If you’re interested in getting more information or signing up, congratulations, and thank you! You’re a better steward of our shared planet than many of your fellow human beings. Go to bostoncomposts.com and peruse the information, including the FAQ page, then fill out the enrollment form and get ready to start keeping some of your food waste from going into the landfill.