The Littleton Garden Gang focuses, with the help of the Zero Waste Gang, on Recycling, and especially, recycling hard-to-recycle items. This is a service for Garden Gang members brought to you by Betty and Ray, with the help of many others, including Sandy Graham.


Newlight Creative Reuse Studio for painting and clean, craft supplies.

The Alliance Center for those hard-to-recycle items.
If you need a refresher on what is accepted, here is the list.
1. BATTERIES Examples: AA, AAA, C, D, 9 volt, hearing aid batteries, button cells, etc.
2. LIGHT BULBS Examples: Incandescent, halogen, compact florescent bulbs (CFLs), etc.
2a. Important Note: They do not accept broken bulbs. Please only bring ones that are intact!
3. WRITING UTENSILS Examples: Pencils, pens, markers, dry erase markers, permanent markers, etc.
4. INK CARTRIDGES Examples: Cartridges for laser, ink and solid printers for both at-home and commercial use.
5. E-WASTE Examples: Computers, screens, cords, video game consoles, printers, etc.
5a. Important Note: They do not accept smoke detectors or Carbon Monoxide detectors.
6. PLASTIC BAGS AND LINERS Examples: Shrink wrap, saran wrap, ziplock bags, bread bags, tortilla chip bags (not foiled lined), cereal bags, six pack rings, flower bouquet wrapping, breast milk bags, boxed wine bags (no cap), etc.
7. PET FOOD AND TREAT BAGS Examples: Large plastic pet food bags, foil-lined treat bags, pet food or treats bags that have multiple paper layers on the inside, etc.
8. FOIL LINED BAGS AND WRAPPERS Examples: Coffee bags, cracker and chip bags, Emergen-C packets, granola bar wrappers, etc.
9. HYGIENE AND BEAUTY PRODUCTS Examples: Deodorant, contact lens containers, make up, razors, lotions, lip stick, oxygen absorbers, perfume containers, loofahs, wet wipe containers, tooth brushes, birth control packets, hand soap dispensers, hair brushes, etc.
9a. Important Note: All items must be empty.
10. BABY FOOD AND DRINK POUCHES Examples: Beachnut Organics, Earth’s Best, Capri Sun, Honest Tea, etc.
10a. Important Note: Please ensure the containers are empty.
11. CLEANING PRODUCTS Examples: Air filters, gloves, spray nozzles, miscellaneous hard plastics, small rigid plastic pieces, plastic lids, trays, six pack rings, scrub brushes, gift cards, etc.
12. WATER FILTERS Examples: Carbon filters, alkaline/water ionizers, UV filters, etc.
12a. Important Note: They take all water filters found in residential and commercial settings. Please make sure filters are dry/not leaking.
Please gather your clean, dry recycling and have it over to Sandy Graham's house no later than April 15.
Remember that the Hard-to-Recycle Station survives on donations,
so please give a little to keep its important services going!
Just put your donation in an envelope when you drop by with materials.
Contact Sandy Graham via email at sangraham@mac.com.

Littleton City Govt has a list of vendors with recycling services.

Tri-County Health has another list of recycling vendors.

Support recycling in Colorado by going to this link and studying the message.

PaintCare has a Colorado affiliate that accepts many paint products at no charge. The link shows what PaintCare will and won’t accept. Once on the site, click on paintcare.org or this link to find the Colorado Program Coordinator for a phone number and email address.

The City of Littleton’s government website has a Reduce, Reuse, Recycle page that lists places to take a variety of materials and at the end, lists the Rx drug take-back, hazardous waste roundup and leaf recycling services that it offers.

TerraCycle partners with companies to offer a variety of free recycling programs. Kroger (King Soopers) is one such partner.

SustainAbility in Arvada is worth the trip if you have enough recyclables to justify the $3 admission fee or any associated fees for certain items. (See the website; there is a long list of what it can/can’t take and what items have special charges beyond the $3 general admission). It does accept hard-to-recycle things like batteries, old books and blocks of styrofoam (but not peanuts or cups).

BlueStar Recyclers in Denver, Boulder and Colorado Springs also charges for its services because it employs people who have autism or other different abilities. You can pay to drop off all kinds of electronics, computers, televisions and small appliances. Data are wiped from computer hard drives.

And then there are Composting Services:
Scraps, compost with scraps,
Wompost a women-owned Composting Service, Lettuce break it down for you,
Compost Colorado (CoCo),
Share Waste, contact Marina via Betty HARRIS.

Here are seven tips to recycling from Earth Day dot org.

The Happy Beetle Door-to-Door Recycling Subscription.
This is a service that LGG member Patty Meek uses.

Electronics Recycling at Douglas County.

Ridwell with scheduled pickups.

UPS (some stores) will take and reuse good strong boxes, bubble packs, pillow packing materials, styrofoam. Boxes for the UPS store do not have to have labels removed or blotted out unless you want to hide your address from the world.

Denver Retrievr At home pickup of your unwanted electronics, now for the city of Denver.



Write to Betty via email.