Drawings, gifts and praise lift spirits among bin crews
Wednesday, 29 April 2020
Residents have been doing their bit to lift the spirits of our hard-working bin crews with colourful children’s drawings and gifts of sweets and biscuits.
Our Executive Member for Community Services, Councillor Ian Dalgarno said:
I’ve heard that in some streets almost every wheelie bin has become an informal gallery, thanking the crews and other key workers. We’ve also received support via social media.
Waste and recycling crews such as drivers and collectors are still out on our streets, as are the street cleaners, carrying out their crucial work to help support our communities, ensuring our quality of life standards remain as high as possible, and doing their part to protect our public health. All against a backdrop of lower than usual manpower.
On their rounds crews have been cheered to find warm handwritten messages, drawings and even bags of sweets and packets of biscuits left by a number of local residents including a three-year old girl.
Commenting on the surprise finds, Brian Ashby, Area Manager of our contractor, FCC Environment, said:
We were overjoyed to receive such encouraging and warm messages from the community. I am immensely proud of the FCC Environment team and the wider waste and resource management industry for doing our very best to continue our day-to-day duties during these extremely challenging times.
We also want to take this opportunity to reassure the public that FCC Environment is working hard to ensure that household waste is collected in a timely manner as well as urging them to continue to reduce, reuse and recycle as much as of their waste as possible.
Household recycling and waste collections are operating as normal in the Central Bedfordshire area. Following government advice, to protect workers and combat the spread of infection, anyone who feels ill at home (whether diagnosed with COVID-19 or not) should:
- place all their waste, including what they’d normally recycle, in the general rubbish bin
- double-bag it, making sure the bags are securely tied
- wait at least 72 hours before placing it out for collection
FCC Environment has been working on our behalf since February 2020, collecting and processing a range of waste from households. The contract includes the provision of 34 new waste and recycling trucks.