Halloween’s scary waste can be managed

COMMENTARY /// Eye on the environment



 

At Halloween, we confront our fears and have fun with spooky sights, but it is also a time of some scary amounts of waste.

According to an article in Redbook by Kelly Marages and distributed through the main MSN.com login screen last week, Americans will spend about $3.8 billion on Halloween candy, $3.4 billion on costumes and $370 million “dressing up their pets” for Halloween this year.

Also, according to Marages, 1.5 billion pounds of pumpkins are produced on over 90,000 acres in the U.S. each year.

Of the waste resulting from these activities, candy wrappers are the least amenable to a solution. Etsy projects cleverly upcycle or reuse folded wrappers in items such as bracelets, and recycling can be accomplished through Terracycle, but these are not viable options for many people. Recycling through Terracycle requires mail-in and payment of $43 for the smallest sized mailer pouch.

One solution is to distribute something other than candy for Halloween. Although trick-or-treaters might be disappointed, individuals can avoid buying a product packaged in non-recyclable wrapping and possibly transported thousands of miles to serve no nutritional purpose. A dentist I know once distributed tooth brushes, but now just keeps his lights turned off.

Halloween waste from costumes can also be reduced. Cheap, plastic, disposable costumes will quickly become waste, but durable, reusable costumes look better and last longer. Shop at thrift stores for high-quality, low-cost costumes, and donate used costumes to a thrift store.

The Camarillo Family YMCA, at 3111 Village at the Park Drive, will host a costume exchange program up to Oct. 31, and it is open to nonmembers. In the lobby, the YMCA charges $10 per costume and $1 for accessories such as masks, hats, and magic wands. If someone drops off a costume, they will get a $10 voucher for a new costume.

According to Paige Harris, youth programs department head, the Y will have costumes available that are left over from last year.

The exchange will relocate to the Halloween at the Y event on Sat., Oct. 26 from 5:30 to 8:30 p.m. This free community event, also open to nonmembers, will feature an outdoor movie, “Hotel Transylvania,” at 6:30 p.m., so bring a lawn chair. The event will also feature a costume contest and food trucks.

Pumpkins, the last of the three main Halloween wastes, can be easily managed. Pumpkins, including seeds, may be recycled in curbside yard waste carta. Pumpkins, like fruit from landscape trees, are an exception to the general rule against food in yard waste carts in Ventura County.

However, put pumpkins in the garbage cart if it has attached self-adhesive plastic rhinestones, glue-gunned beads, studs, rivets or other unnatural decorations. No one wants Halloween pumpkin bling contaminating the compost of their spring flower beds.

David Goldstein is an Environmental Analyst with the Ventura County Public Works Agency.