Seven Tons to Date

That’s the same weight of two or three adult elephants, equivalent to roughly six giraffes. You’ve got to admit that’s a lot of kitchen waste diverted from going to a landfill and turned into compost by the intake at the Newburyport Senior Community Center (NSCC). Just since the soft launch of the program in late 2024 and beginning to hit its stride this year. The “Drop a Bag Get a Bag” initiative is part of the Senior/Community Center’s journey to become a “ZERO WASTE” facility.

Lead by NSCC Director Sara Landry and ACES Board Member Ben Iacono and Nicki Girouard, a waste collection campaign for composting is one of two programs being ramped up as we go into the Fall. NSCC is truly bringing best practices to waste reduction efforts.

The NSCC is more than just a social and recreational gathering spot. It has also become an epicenter of seniors helping address and solve community problems by tackling key needs in our community. One of those needs is to reduce waste being generated in our community and carry a high disposal cost in the City’s budgets.

This waste is more than just physical material. It carries with it throughout its supply chain journey a host of health, climate and environmental costs. Like plastics and their chemical leaching and the methane gas released from landfills where we send it. Humans think out of sight, out of mind. But that’s not really true, is it?

Focusing on waste reduction, under the leadership of Sara Landry, the Center and the Community who make it so vibrant a space have launched several initiatives to move towards zero waste.

Using the slogan, "Drop a Bag, Get a Bag" and offering free compostable 1 gallon kitchen zip lock food waste bags, the Center now is now spinning a virtuous cycle of saving organic waste, including bones and some paper product such as tea bags and coffee filters. Since launching the effort 11 months ago the daily removal of waste from the landfill path has grown steadily. Composting prevents filling landfills and prevents the greenhouse gas methane from being generated as the material is professionally processed by the ‘Black Earth Compost” service. Composting not only prevents waste and air pollution, it recycles the nutrients needed to keep our farm fields and gardens productive.

A second initiative, the monthly ECO-conversations co-sponsored with ACES, has included important topics for a healthy city, like plastics pollution and waste reduction. These sessions engage 25-30 folks at a session and have yielded ideas and personal commitments to be more attentive to reducing waste.

And now the NSCC team has created and has begun to train and staff a cadre of Waste Ambassadors to provide community outreach and education. The first of these are Audrey Clarkson, Charles Boelke , Fran Norton, and Nicki Girouard. By engaging folks both in the Center and in their own circles of influence, they are creating a ground swell of seniors focusing on waste. And measured by the amount of compost bags being returned and questions and suggestions about reducing plastics in our lives and in our bodies, they are making a difference. It's starting a course correction that is putting future generations on a better path to a healthy earth.

Molly Ettenborough, Newburyport’s Recycling and Energy Manager, is excited by the program and its potential to change behaviors at the grass roots level. Having everyone, at every age and stage of life, paying attention and changing how they approach waste in their daily lives, really models the kind of behavior we all need to practice. This community modeling and Waste Ambassador program is brilliant”

So, listen to your elders, grandparents, and kids when it comes to organic, kitchen food waste, composting is a better way to help the planet and the health of the neighborhood. Let us know of your ideas in this effort.

ACES team members believe everyone can make a BIG difference together. Team members invite you to stay updated on environmental matters by subscribing to our monthly newsletter via the “Subscribe to Updates” link on ACES’ website – https://www.aces-alliance.org/. Please consider joining our community of stewards committed to Make Every Day Earth Day by contacting acesnewburyport@gmail.com.

This educational column was originally published by The Daily News of Newburyport on September 5, 2025.