The place looked like an old Western movie without the frequent tumbleweeds and the omnipresence of Clint Eastwood. There was a lot of dust and a lot of noise. Yet, behind the old building, with its distinguishable rust-colored shackles held by the strength of a few nails, lays a tube-shaped building accumulating the blunt of the particles floating through the air. It looks like a bomb shelter built in the 1940s.
In an area unknown to the majority of students is the powerhouse of the University.
This place is Jeff Ziglinski’s domain.
Ziglinski began working at the University’s Campus Recycling Program in its early beginnings, around 1992. He was a free-spirited, music-playing University student who left his roots in Salem to mold into the counterculture of Eugene. With a strong love of music, Ziglinski never imagined himself working at Campus Recycling after he graduated. Yet more than 10 years later, Ziglinski’s lifestyle of recycling became his job. Ziglinski wakes up before 8 a.m. most mornings and commutes down to the same place as he did when he was a student.
Recycling has increased in Eugene because of the city’s diverse culture.
Of course, this wasn’t an instant transformation. Even though many Eugeneans consciously participate in recycling, there are still many who chose not to or, without knowing it, do it incorrectly.
And Ziglinski has witnessed the majority of those recycling mishaps.
Not only do many people recycle incorrectly, but there is a tendency for people to throw away items that are full of solids or liquids that can seep through and ruin the recyclable material below.
Unfortunately, the types of trash Ziglinski and his workers, about 45-50 University students, find can be utterly revolting.
“We would definitely qualify for ‘Dirty Jobs,’” Ziglinski said, laughing.
Yet despite the muck and remnants Ziglinski has unfortunately rummaged through, he has witnessed the awareness of students and the community flourish.
“Eugene is a beautiful place, and people are dedicated to keeping it this way,” Ziglinski said.
Robyn Hathcock also began working for the Campus Recycling Program when she was a student. After she graduated, the program hired her as the housing recycling coordinator.
In the course of a day, Hathcock can do anything from driving one of the various vans around to different sites to sorting through various barrels of paper to navigating through narrow hallways in the bottom of residence hallways. The job also requires making field calls to different crews gathering the recycling across campus. All in all, Hathcock knows her role is contributing to a great cause.
“I also knew that I was a part of a service that was valuable to my university, my state, my country and the planet,” Hathcock said.
Like Ziglinksi, Hathcock has also watched the growth of recycling in Eugene.
Eugene is lucky to have the market for recyclable materials and the commitment of the community to reuse, reduce, and recycle. Other places, especially rural areas, are not as fortunate.
Paper and plastics are not the only items filling up the massive green garbage bins inside the Campus Recycling warehouse. With a rapid change in technology, many items are being abandoned for the new. There are more VHSs in the warehouse than any modern, surviving video store. Abandoned overhead slides that are no longer fit projectors fill bins and another bin is entirely devoted to CDs, reaffirming they are no longer a needed commodity in modern day society.
With items like these, Campus Recycling works to find ways and places to keep these items out of the landfill.
And while Ziglinski and Hathcock both found a passion that also provides them with a source of income, the University alumni hope recycling will turn into a lifestyle for the students on campus, just like it has for them.
Recycling materials isn’t the only option to eliminate waste. Simple things, such as unplugging electronics that aren’t in use, shorter showers and carrying around a reusable water bottle, are small ways to help out our planet.
And although the Campus Recycling staff may stay incognito and below students’ radar on the other side of Franklin Boulevard, their efforts should not go unnoticed.
Even though we may not know the faces of the various workers who pick up and sort through thousands of our recycled materials, we can see their efforts in the green bins to the white vans that display the symbol of their mission: to reduce, reuse and recycle.
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O’Brien: Campus Recycling all about green
Daily Emerald
February 20, 2011
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