Oct. 2, 2014 (BALTIMORE, MD) — No longer will living in an apartment building keep many Baltimore City residents from contributing to the benefits of recycling. As of Oct. 1, Maryland law requires property owners or managers of apartment buildings or condominiums with at least 10 units to provide recycling services to their residents.

For years, Baltimore residents who live in single-family homes have enjoyed convenient weekly recycling pickup from their alley or front curb, courtesy of the Department of Public Works’ Bureau of Solid Waste. But those in apartment buildings received no such guarantees, and in many cases had to transport their own recycling to one of the DPW’s Citizens’ Convenience Centers.

“We are working with residential property owners and managers to make sure that for even more Baltimore City residents, the opportunity to recycle much of their waste is just a few steps away,” said DPW Director Rudy Chow, P.E. “We are committed to the ‘Drive to 35’ recycling goal to increase the City’s recycling rate to 35% and plugging in thousands of City residents to the recycling stream will be a tremendous help – for everyone.”

Residents of buildings with at least 10 units who find that recycling is still not available may contact the DPW Office of Recycling at 410-396-1185.

The DPW’s single-stream recycling program collects paper, glass containers, and many plastics and metals – and allows residents to put them all in the same container. Even some materials that cannot be taken from the curbside program – including electronics and Styrofoam – can be safely recycled by taking them to the Citizens’ Convenience Centers.

For more information about ways to reduce, recycle and re-use check under the Recycling tab of the PublicWorks.BaltimoreCity.gov website.