By Andy Byrnes
Contributing Writer

Recycling is a good thing. Ask anyone. It’s good for everyone and everything; people, the environment, the economy – yes, even the economy. However, if you happen to be a community-minded volunteer in a rural area where recycling is still more of a concept in the collective conscience than a reality, it can be a tad frustrating.

“It’s the true believers who want to do this,” says Mindy Hamlett, one of the handful of volunteers who make recycling work for the Big Bend’s residents and visitors. “We want to see recycling work in this area, but sometimes when you show up on a Saturday to make sure everything is sorted properly for delivery to the recycling center in the National Park and you discover that people have just left all their garbage in bags by our trailer, well, you’d like to strangle somebody.”

“That can be a problem,” says Pat Walker, owner of the Terlingua Springs Market and Coffee House and a volunteer who also donates the use of her property for the recycling program’s pickup truck and trailer. “But mostly it’s people who don’t quite understand the recycling concept. What they tend to do is not take the time to read what is recyclable and what is not; what stuff has to be separated. People don’t sort. They don’t put their stuff in the appropriate cans. I think we notice the things that are done poorly because we’re such a small, bootstraps operation. 98% of the people do it absolutely perfectly.”

“But the other 2% can make it a total pain in the ass,” said Hamlett.

Exacerbating the problem is the lack of public trash receptacles in the south county area. While many businesses have dumpsters on their property, those dumpsters are for the private use of the business owner. The county provides very few.

“There’s actually only one public trash can in the entire area, if you can believe that” said Walker. “And that’s located in that little triangle at the intersection of 170 and 118. That’s it. Let’s face it, our economy is based on tourism and there’s really no place for the tourists to leave their trash. When they drive by our trailer and see all those barrels, well you can understand why they do it.”

Terlingua’s fledgling recycling program, sponsored by the also-fledgling Big Bend Chamber of Commerce, has experienced its share of growing pains, but quite a few positive things have also happened in the 18 months or so that the program has existed. Last year the Rio Grande Electric Cooperative donated a diesel pickup truck to haul the recycled material up to the much larger recycling facilities in Big Bend National Park, volunteers Sue and Terry Ervin donated an open trailer, and very recently Brewster County created a line item of $600 in its budget for the program courtesy of County Commissioner Kathy Killingsworth.

“We literally could not exist without the help we’ve received from the outside,” said Ms. Walker. “John King, the last superintendent at the National Park made the decision to allow us to bring our recycled stuff to their facility because ‘it was the right thing to do.’ He probably didn’t make his staff very happy at the time, but for us it was definitely the right thing.”

“When we make our deliveries we stay up there for half a day or so and clean up their facility for them,” said Hamlett. “They’ve never asked us to or made it a requirement, but we owe them something, that’s for sure.”

“We do it as a quid pro quo,” said Ms. Walker. “And it really is fun. It’s hard work but to get into the car with a group of people - working towards a common goal with your buddies – it’s quite enjoyable.”

For those who are completely unfamiliar with the program in South County, the recycling pickup and trailer are located on FM 170 on the east bank of Terlingua Creek right next to the Terlingua Springs Market. At this point in time it is open and available for drop-offs every day. On the trailer are several 50-gallon drums labeled for all sorts of different recyclables. The volunteers ask that you place your recyclables into the properly labeled barrel. Please do not leave your stuff in boxes or bags next to the trailer. Cardboard, dried and flattened, should go into the truck bed. They will accept cardboard, plastic and aluminum cans, but they do not accept plastic coolant or motor oil containers and can no longer accept bottles.

“They’ll still accept bottles at the national park,” said Ms. Hamlett. “But even they don’t really recycle them. They reduce them. They grind them up and put them in a landfill.”

“It’s evidently cheaper to make a new bottle than it is to recycle an old one,” said Ms. Walker. “For us, the glass is heavy and we need the room on the trailer for the rest of the stuff. Also, manpower is a problem for us.”

Speaking of which, anyone who wishes to become one of the “true believers” has only to wander into the Terlingua Springs Market and offer their services. Right now about seven or eight people are carrying the entire recycling load.

“If we had ten or 12 volunteers, you might only have to make the trip into the park every month or two,” said Hamlett.

If you don’t have the time or inclination to volunteer your services, the group will gladly accept donations in any amount. They’ve got to keep that truck fueled up after all, or those recyclables aren’t going anywhere.

Andy Byrnes is a bartender and writer from New York where every bartender is either a writer or an actor. Andy’s face – by his own admission – is more suited to the written word than the stage or silver screen, but that doesn’t mean that he has agreed to describe himself in this newspaper. Andy and his wife Rose have lived in Terlingua for two years after spending 12 years at the helm of The Adirondack Mountain Sun, a weekly newspaper in upstate New York. They do not miss upstate New York – especially that part of upstate New York that is 30 degrees below zero for weeks on end.

TRUE BELIEVERS – The volunteers of the Big Bend Recycling program took time out from their labors to pose for this photo prior to departure for Big Bend National Park. They are (front row, l-r) Zoey Sexton, Mindy Hamlett, Shannon Carter and Pat Walker; (back row, l-r) Sue Ervin, Terry Ervin and Dottie Harding. Anyone who wishes to join in the South County recycling effort need only apply in person at the Terlingua Springs Market and Coffee Shop. (Byrnes Photo)