Over the last six years, Gwinnett Clean & Beautiful (GC&B) has hosted a community-wide Earth Day-themed recycling event on a Saturday in April for the convenience of Gwinnett County residents. For the first time since 2017, Earth Day will fall on a Saturday – giving the Keep America Beautiful affiliate the perfect opportunity to host its annual Earth Day Recycling Event ON the actual holiday. Co-hosted with Gwinnett County Solid Waste, this year’s event will take place Saturday, April 22, from 9 am to noon at Coolray Field in Lawrenceville. Items collected that day will include latex and oil-based paints, electronics, tires, clothing, sneakers, and paper for shredding.

“Celebrated by more than a billion people all over the planet since 1970, we are excited to participate in the world’s largest environmental movement ON Earth Day,” said Schelly Marlatt, Executive Director of Gwinnett Clean & Beautiful. “Designed to change human behavior and create opportunities for civic engagement and volunteerism, this year’s theme is ‘Invest in our Planet,’ so we’re asking our Gwinnett County neighbors to invest their time by either volunteering for this event or by combing through their closets, file cabinets, garages, basements, attics, and storage sheds for items they no longer need that can be recycled into new products. It’s a win-win. Local residents get to declutter their homes, and we get to divert tons of items from our local landfills and give them new life!”

According to the official Earth Day website at EarthDay.org, “Investing in our planet is necessary to protect it and the best way to pave a path towards a prosperous future.” Marlatt wholeheartedly agreed with that sentiment and encouraged Gwinnett County residents to help GC&B make this year’s event the largest one on record. During last year’s event, Earth Day organizers helped 1,549 neighbors recycle 175,540 lbs. of items they no longer needed within the event’s three-hour window. All told, 44,000 lbs. of electronics, 6,682 gallons of paint, 14 tons of tires, 2,720 lbs. of clothing and sneakers were collected for recycling, and 34,000 lbs. of paper were collected for shredding.

Beyond the all-important act of recycling, the Earth Day Celebration will include Touch-A-Truck, refreshments, a chance for residents to meet their haulers, opportunities to learn more about programs and services from various county departments, and more. Throughout the April 22 “rain-or-shine” event, the following items will be collected:

• Paper for secure shredding (Please limit to five copier paper boxes per vehicle)
• Electronics (Recycling is free except for TVs, monitors, and printers – $15 cash fee per monitor or TV; $5 cash fee per printer; projection/console TVs are $35 cash fee)
• Oil-based and latex paint (Please limit to 10 gallons per vehicle - cans must contain 25% wet paint)
• Tires (Please limit to eight tires per vehicle; no dealer tires)
• Clothing and sneakers

Materials should be placed in disposable containers or boxes. Containers cannot be returned. Coolray Field is located at 2500 Buford Drive in Lawrenceville. To register as a volunteer for Gwinnett County’s Earth Day recycling event, visit the Volunteer Gwinnett page under the Employment tab at www.GwinnettCounty.com. To learn more about this and other upcoming Gwinnett Clean & Beautiful events, please visit www.gwinnettcb.org. Questions may be directed to [email protected] or 770-822-5187.