From laptops to Legos: What to expect as Evanston Recycles returns this weekend

The city’s annual Evanston Recycles event returns from 9 a.m. to noon Saturday, June 28 at Evanston Township High School, 1600 Dodge Ave., offering residents a one-stop drop-off site to safely clear out recyclable items from their households. For the first time, Climate Action Evanston will also join the event to accept items for reuse and upcycling.

As in past years, Evanston Recycles will take in electronics, medications and documents for shredding, according to the city’s website. Among the new items Climate Action Evanston will accept are bicycles and bike parts, which can be donated through Working Bikes, a Chicago nonprofit which fixes up and sells or donates old bikes.

“We’re collecting things for repurposing whenever possible,” said Tom Mulhern, who leads Climate Action Evanston’s Beyond Waste Program. “In the event that we can’t do any of those things, then we find a way to recycle it.”

Residents will also have the opportunity to bring in a few “odd” items, Mulhern said.

Legos will be sorted and donated to Peace Brix, a Chicago-based nonprofit, which will redistribute the pieces to STEM classrooms along with lesson plans. Used tennis balls will also be donated to the Evanston Animal Shelter.

Brian Zimmerman, Evanston’s solid waste coordinator, said in past years Evanston Recycles has attracted more than 1,000 residents who bring items for recycling with their cars. There has also been an increasing number of walk-ins or people biking to the event, he said.

Zimmerman said the event reflects Evanston’s broader commitment to sustainability and environmental stewardship.

“The kind of really cool synergistic thing about Evanston is that we like to do environmental things,” he said.

The materials collected Saturday will follow different paths depending on their type.

Electronics, otherwise known as “e-waste,” are among the nation’s fastest-growing waste streams. Unlike paper, plastic and glass, electronics require specialized processing, Zimmerman said. They must be handled through dedicated recycling vendors rather than curbside programs.

“You have to think of all the different rare metals that exist in an electronic,” Zimmerman said. “There’s gold in there, there’s copper in there, there’s other types of metals that all ideally are getting separated out because they have different value streams for different vendors to be turning into new products or new uses.”

In Illinois, electronics such as tablets, phones, TVs or computers are currently banned from landfill disposal.

The event will also offer a more secure way for people to dispose of paper documents. These are shredded on-site before being transported to a secure facility, where the paper is baled and prepared for recycling, Zimmerman said.

When it comes to medication disposal, Zimmerman said things are “a little different.” Collected medications are handled through specialized disposal pathways designed to break down their chemical compounds, helping avoid environmental hazards.

“Historically over decades, we’ve spent a lot of our time throwing those materials away into landfills,” Zimmerman said. “When we do things like recycling and composting and other types of reuse initiatives, we’re keeping those raw materials and higher use sets than (having) them sitting in a hole in the ground.”

Councilmember Jonathan Nieuwsma (4th Ward) said he’s glad Climate Action Evanston is so involved in the city’s sustainability efforts. Nieuwsma was a board member for nine years, when the organization was formerly called Citizens’ Greener Evanston.

In the future, Nieuwsma said he hopes the city is able to host events like this more frequently. He said recycling fairs like Evanston Recycles are an important step to fulfilling Evanston’s Climate Action and Resilience Plan, which calls for zero carbon and zero waste by 2050.

“The city has certainly a role to play in establishing high level goals and policies and local ordinances that point us in the right direction,” Nieuwsma said.

Zimmerman added that he hopes for favorable weather this weekend, as it could encourage more residents to take advantage of the event.

However, Evanston Recycles will proceed regardless of weather conditions.“We will be there, rain or shine,” Zimmerman said.