Allison Dasso collects dead batteries, lightbulbs and unwanted electronics throughout the year, and on one day, she disposes of them all in an environmentally friendly manner that leaves her feeling good about herself.
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Instead of throwing them out as garbage, the Buffalo grove resident said, she takes them to the annual Green Fair sponsored by the Buffalo Grove Environmental Action Team.
“Been coming here since it started eight years ago,” Dasso said as she attended Sunday’s edition at at Mike Rylko Community Park. “It’s a good place to drop off your stuff, because you know it won’t end up in a landfill. It’ll get disposed of properly.”
On Sunday, the 25 booths at the fair were set to deliver a message of sustainability through programs, initiatives and the dispersal of information.
Buffalo Grove Environmental Action Team founder Jeff Weiss said one clean strategy the group is very proud to show off is the new “At Your Door Special Collection Service” program.
Through the program’s partnership between the village and the Waste Management waste collection service, residents can now schedule home pickup of hazardous materials, such as dead batteries, latex paint, herbicides and antifreeze.
Weiss said instead of having to wait for a community collection day to haul their items to that location, residents have an added convenience factor that will hopefully make it that much easier for them to carry out.
Weiss called the contract agreement a key objective of the group.
Another organization on display Sunday works with discarded floral items. Random Acts of Flowers takes in donations of fresh flowers and vases and quickly turns those donations around by prepping them and delivering them to places where they’ll be appreciated, said volunteer Lisa Durfey.
The national nonprofit makes the flower-arrangement deliveries to places such as nursing homes, hospitals and veteran organizations, where a little pick-me-up can bring out a smile.
“A lot of the time, people are surprised by the gesture,” Durfey said. “They’re reminded they’re not alone at what might be a low point in their life.”
With a pickup truck filled with kid and adult bicycles Sunday, Phil Kaplan, board president of the Working Bikes organization, said it’s always a little tricky piling the bikes on the back of the truck, but he’s always grateful for the donations.
On Sunday, he got about 25 bikes donated.
Kaplan said Working Bikes refurbishes those old bikes people donate and distributes them to places across the world where a bike is a mode of transportation that can improve people’s lives exponentially.
Most recently, Kaplan sent a shipment of bicycles to Malawi, he said. Last year, the nonprofit also sent a mechanic to Uganda to train five women on how to operate a bike repair shop.
“Now we send them hundreds of bikes a year for them to be able to have jobs by repairing the bikes in this male-dominated society,” Kaplan said. “That’s about women empowerment.”
Locally, bikes are gifted to veterans, housing insecure individuals, refugees and needy kids in Chicago, Kaplan said.
Other booths at the event included the Buffalo Grove Park District, with which the Environmental Action Team partners with for programming and events, and vendors selling natural products.
The Buffalo Grove Environmental Action Team began 10 years ago with a mission to increase awareness and improve the community’s natural environment.
Yadira Sanchez Olson is a freelance reporter for the News-Sun.