ALBION – Orleans County residents will soon have three drop-off sites for televisions and other “e-waste.”

Garbage crews stopped picking up the televisions on Jan. 1, and residents instead have been discarding many of the TVs into ditches and along country roads.

Legislature Chairman David Callard said about 500 have been picked up by highway crews this year.

The Legislature on Wednesday approved a deal with Sunnking Incorporated of Brockport to pick up and dispose of cathode ray tube televisions, monitors, computers, peripheral devices and other household electronics.

The company will be paid $14,782 annually for the service, effective Aug. 26.

“This is a plan in the interim while the state gets its act together,” said Chuck Nesbitt, the county chief administrative officer.

Residents will be able to drop the household electronics at the Murray Town Hall, Orleans County Highway Department in Albion, and Shelby Town Hall.

The state on Jan. 1 began banning curbside disposal of older TVs with cathode-ray technology. Many residents have upgraded from those televisions, switching to popular flat screens. Many of the older TVs have been dumped in ditches along rural roads.

Manufacturers were supposed to take back older TVs, but the state capped the amount of discarded material companies have to accept each year. Manufacturers have been hitting that cap midway through the year.

“The issue is exacerbated by the fact that electronics currently sold today are much lighter than the obsolete CRT devices that make up about 70 percent of the weight of e-scrap generated, which are cost intensive to responsibly manage,” according to a resolution passed by the County Legislature and other local municipalities.

“As a result, many local governments across the state have grappled with the burden to fund or cease e-scrap collection, which has been particularly difficult in rural communities that do not benefit from retail collectors or economies of scale,” according to the resolution.

The County Legislature and other local municipalities are asking Gov. Cuomo, the State Legislature and State Department of Environmental Conservation to work towards a long-term solution for electronic waste recycling for both urban and rural areas.

“We’re excited to get this under control,” Callard said on Wednesday, when the county announced the plan. “It’s a commendable program.”

State responds to Orleans Hub article about county reaching deal to collect TV’s and other e-waste

Statement from NYS Department of Environmental Conservation

ALBANY – The NYS Department of Environmental Conservation would like to provide information and address the inaccuracies regarding the NYS Electronic Equipment Recycling and Reuse Act (Act) which appeared in the Orleans Hub article entitled “County approves deal to collect TV’s and other e-waste” dated August 27, 2015. (Click here to see that article.)

Since the Act was implemented in 2011, NYS consumers have the opportunity to recycle a wide variety of electronic waste (e-waste), such as computers, computer peripherals, televisions, small scale servers and other small electronic equipment in an environmentally responsible manner, through the use of manufacturers’ e-waste acceptance programs.

In fact, from 2011 through 2014 over 350,000 pounds of e-waste has been collected across the state for recycling/reuse.

Under the Act, manufacturers of covered electronic equipment (CEE) are required to provide free and convenient recycling of e-waste to consumers across the state. The Act allows manufacturers to utilize a variety of methods to accept e-waste from consumers (i.e. collection sites, events, mail back programs, etc.), which means there may not be a physical e-waste drop-off location available to all consumers.

In accordance with the Act, manufacturers are required to run a year-round, continuous e-waste acceptance program and are required to collect a minimum weight of e-waste based upon their market share. There is no limit to the amount of e-waste a manufacturer or their affiliated recycling partners may accept. The state has not “capped the amount of discarded material companies have to accept each year” as stated in the article.

Consumers wanting further information on how to properly recycle their e-waste should visit DEC’s webpage for consumers by clicking here.

Also available on DEC’s website is a listing of registered electronic waste collection site locations sorted by county. Click here to see the list.

Illegal dumping of e-waste should be reported to local authorities. The Department will pursue enforcement action when necessary. Any questions regarding the Act or how to properly recycle e-waste should be directed to DEC’s E-waste Team at: ewaste@dec.ny.gov or 518-402-8706.