Siblings Win Matching Prizes in Museum Recycling Contest

Siblings Win Matching Prizes in Museum Recycling Contest

Sister and brother Nora and Emmett Allen have both earned scholarships to attend a weeklong LEGO Summer Camp – the grand prize in an innovative contest to create the best home-crafted trash truck.

The local siblings’ winning entry was announced on June 18 by the Museum of Ventura County, which sponsored the contest.

The trash truck contest was the highlight of a weekend, recycling-focused drive-thru event hosted May 1-2 by the Museum of Ventura County.

Harrison was the main sponsor of the youth-oriented family event, which also included the giveaway of grab bags full of fun and educational goodies.

“Small Footprints: Reduce, Reuse and Recycle” was the theme of the simple, COVID-safe “Grab-and-Go” event, which sought to promote the vital importance of children learning to recycle and protect the environment, for their own future.

“The Museum of Ventura County is grateful to have a long and meaningful relationship with E.J. Harrison,” said museum development director Eric Knight, “and we’re honored to have this opportunity to once again work with the Harrison family, in bringing this message of sustainability to the public.”

NEW WEEKLY 3-CART TRASH SERVICE Starts July 5 – and NO DELAY Due to 4th of July Holiday

NEW WEEKLY 3-CART TRASH SERVICE Starts July 5 – and NO DELAY Due to 4th of July Holiday

Beginning the week of July 5, E.J. Harrison & Sons will begin weekly curbside collection of ALL THREE carts – trash, recycling and yard waste – at no additional charge! Note: Your pickup day of the week will not change. Simply set out all three carts on your regularly scheduled pickup day.

ALSO the week of July 5: There will be no delay in service due to the Fourth of July holiday.

The new three-cart service upgrade will provide more room for you to recycle and allow Harrison to divert more materials from the landfill. 

For additional information, call 805-647-4141.

Prevent Food Waste; Save Money and Resources

Prevent Food Waste; Save Money and Resources

We Americans waste a lot of food. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, each of us tosses out about a pound of food each day, on average.

That amounts to about a third of all the food that’s produced in our country – and about 150,000 tons of food EVERY DAY. Fruits and vegetables are the most likely to be discarded, followed by dairy and meat.

What a massive waste of resources – and money! In dollars, it’s estimated to equal $218 billion a year – more than the state of California’s annual budget.

Even as we look ahead to the coming of curbside food waste recycling, we all should do our part to shop smarter and waste less. Here are some easy tips to reduce food waste:

Shop smart

  • Browse at home first. Before you shop, survey your fridge and cupboards to avoid buying food you already have.
  • Eat before you shop. Impulse food buying goes through the roof when we’re hungry. We shop much smarter when our bellies are full.
  • Have a menu. Make a list of the meal and snack ingredients you’ll need to feed your household until your next shopping trip. (Pro tip: Include a “leftovers night.”) This will greatly help you buy only what you need.
  • Buy fresh foods in small quantities. Perishables are, of course, the most wasted foods. Seriously consider how much you really eat. Don’t buy four salad meals if you’re only likely to eat two. Don’t buy a dozen bananas for one person.

Store food effectively

  • Prominently display perishables. Before you put your fresh food items away, take the time to wash, dry and prep them and then place them in clear storage containers for easy use.
  • Consider your containers. Use storage bags or filtered bins designed to help extend the life of your produce.
  • Check sell-by dates. Eat the food in order of stated or likely expiration.
  • Do your homework. Learn which fruits and vegetables stay fresh longer inside or outside the fridge.
  • Use your freezer. Whenever possible, freeze items for later. Many perishables can be frozen – including a lot that may surprise you. Here’s a partial list: nuts; fresh fruits including seedless grapes, bananas, berries and avocados; fresh veggies including onions, peppers, spinach, mushrooms and corn; fresh herbs; tomato paste, purees and sauces; soups and chili; mashed potatoes; rice and other grains; cooked pasta; fresh milk and buttermilk; yogurt; butter; eggs; cheese; and bacon. Note: Many foods will need to be stored specially and thawed in particular ways; Google it for details.

Give back to the Earth!

  • Compost. Even without your trash hauler’s help, a lot of your food waste, as well as yard and other waste, can bypass your trash, recycling and yard waste barrels – via home compost systems. Backyard composting bins can be simple, but you have to pay attention to the instructions, as they do require particular amounts of heat, moisture, content balance and care.

What’s compostable? Here’s a partial list: produce; eggshells; coffee grounds and filters; tea bags; nutshells; shredded newspaper; yard trimmings and grass clippings; houseplants, hay and straw; leaves; sawdust and wood chips; cotton and wool rags; dryer and vacuum lint; hair and fur; and fireplace ashes.Contact your local city or garden center for details and any available incentives to set up a home composter.

Watch For New Color-Coded Trash, Recycling Carts

Watch For New Color-Coded Trash, Recycling Carts

E.J. Harrison & Sons will begin delivering new trash and recycling carts that will comply with California’s Senate Bill 1383, which creates a statewide uniform color system for all carts, bins and roll-offs. The new containers will slowly roll out across the state in the coming years.

Meanwhile, residents will continue to use their green, blue and tan carts.

Here are the color changes coming, based on SB 1383 rules:
• New black carts will replace green trash carts.
• The blue recycle carts will remain blue.
• New green carts will replace the tan/brown carts that are used for yard/green waste.

While the state requires all carts to be replaced by 2036, Harrison expects to completely phase in the new carts within a few years

The state deadline for carts to begin to be replaced is Jan. 1, 2022.

The next generation of 32-, 64- and 96-gallon fully automated carts are slightly shorter than the ones they will replace, but they are wider and heavier, which should make them more stable during wind events.
New carts will be delivered to customers along with how-to flyers explaining exactly what to do with each cart.

For more information, call Harrison at 805-647-1414.

‘Small Footprints’ Recycling Events Set for May 1-2

‘Small Footprints’ Recycling Events Set for May 1-2

The vital importance of children learning to recycle and protect the environment, for their own future, is at the heart of a unique pair of family-oriented community events being sponsored by E.J. Harrison & Sons and hosted this weekend by the Museum of Ventura County.

“Small Footprints: Reduce, Reuse and Recycle” is the theme of the simple, COVID-safe “Grab-and-Go” drive-thru events, which will begin both days at 10 a.m. – on Saturday, May 1, at the Agriculture Museum in Santa Paula and on Sunday, May 2, at the main Museum of Ventura County in downtown Ventura. The events will end as soon as the museums’ fun grab bags have been given out, so anyone planning to attend is encouraged to arrive early.

Those attending on Saturday should drive by the front of the Agricultural Museum, along Santa Paula’s Railroad Avenue. Those attending on Sunday should enter the parking lot off Ventura’s East Santa Clara Street behind the Main Street museum. Parking attendants will help direct visitors.

Drive-thru visitors will receive gift bags that include fun and informative recycling-themed activities and coloring books; copies of “Mateo Learns About the Three Rs,” an inspiring booklet about one boy’s education in recycling; educational materials on the 3 Rs and what goes in your recycle carts; sustainability-themed recipes from Food Forward; and templates and entry details for the event’s big draw: a family contest to find Ventura County’s best home-crafted trash truck. The contest winner will get a scholarship for a weeklong LEGO Summer Camp.

“The Museum of Ventura County is grateful to have a long and meaningful relationship with E.J. Harrison,” said Eric Knight, development director for the museums, “and we’re honored to have this opportunity to once again work with the Harrison family, in bringing this message of sustainability to the public.”

We’re proud to be the main sponsor of these awesome youth-focused museum events. The future is our children and we need to educate them however we can about climate change and the importance of recycling.

We also are happy to announce that this “Small Footprints” event will kick off our yearlong celebration of Harrison’s 90th anniversary in business.

Join Us in Making Earth Day Every Day

Join Us in Making Earth Day Every Day

Earth Day is one day a year: April 22. But its message is ongoing.

Facing the dire effects of climate change, the Earth desperately needs our help. At Harrison, we do our part every day – running a clean company with our fleet of all natural-gas trucks and evident in our consistent place on the Climate Registry, which honors companies throughout North America that take voluntary steps to measure their operations’ carbon footprints.

Locally, we help year-round in our communities, by co-sponsoring cleanup events whenever asked, and we continue to support the Ventura Surfrider Foundation in its vital beach cleanups.

Through advanced recycling practices and community advocacy, we take great pride in doing whatever we can to prevent waste from ending up in the landfills, which emit the toxic methane gases that present the greatest threat to our environment.

As we do what we can to help, we hope that you will too, in the easy ways you can. Keep recycling, of course. Cut down on plastic. And help out in your community: Take a bag with you when you go walking and make a fun chore of picking up random trash, which would otherwise end up in the sewer system and ultimately our oceans.

Our wish for Earth Day and every day is that you’ll join us in doing your part to keep our beaches, the ocean and our land empty of trash.

Harrison Keeps it Green: Climate Registry

Harrison Keeps it Green: Climate Registry

We’re still leading the ecological charge, achieving well beyond carbon neutrality in terms of greenhouse gas emissions. According to the latest Climate Registry and Avoided Emissions Reporting, Harrison Industries has fully offset its direct GHG emissions surpassing net zero in emissions by 21 times.

“As you can imagine, any company just trying to get to net zero is hard,” said Bill Camarillo, CEO of Harrison partner Agromin, “but the Harrisons have been able to average, over 10 years, 21 times greater than net zero, which is a tremendous accomplishment.”

It’s a remarkable number but not unexpected. We have a well tracked history of avoided emissions – including a fleet of trucks that run entirely on clean fuel – and following all of the protocol. We see this as our greatest responsibility and our greatest success as a trash/recycle company.

We at Harrison are very proud of our annual high ranking on the prestigious Climate Registry, which monitors greenhouse gas emissions. 

Harrison joined The Climate Registry in 2008 – just after the registry was formed – and it’s met its goal of remaining far ahead of the clean-air curve every year. The Climate Registry is a nonprofit organization designed and created in 2007 to manage and reduce businesses’ greenhouse gas emissions. Governed by U.S. states and Canadian provinces and territories, the registry operates GHG reporting programs globally and assists organizations in measuring, reporting and verifying the carbon in their operations in order to manage and reduce it.

Honored to Help Rebuild Arroyo Verde Park

Honored to Help Rebuild Arroyo Verde Park

The rebuilt playground at Arroyo Verde Park will feature new play structures, a sensory garden, planting areas, decomposed granite path, concrete side-walks, two new drinking fountains, updated ADA parking and an upgraded accessible path of travel to the existing restroom. (Rendering courtesy of the Ventura Community Partners Foundation)

Ventura’s Arroyo Verde Park is a uniquely beautiful piece of land and a treasured part of the city’s history.

Open to the public since 1961, the wooded, 132-acre hiking park in the hills and canyons above Foothill and Day roads took a major hit three and a half years ago when it was badly damaged in the Thomas Fire. Among other things, the park’s popular playground was destroyed.

The playground rebuild has been a long, involved and expensive project spearheaded by the city, in conjunction with the Ventura Community Partners Foundation and with the help of generous community donors. The upgraded, 10,000-square-foot, inclusive playground is expected to open in late 2021.

In Harrison’s ongoing efforts to give back to our partner cities – and especially to help local youths – we have taken a leading role in sponsoring the playground rebuild project. The city thanked us kindly recently, during a virtual City Council meeting in which Harrison was publicly commemorated for being the project’s No. 1 corporate donor.

Harrison’s donation is “going to go a long way toward getting this rebuild done,” Ventura Mayor Matt LaVere said at the meeting.

“We wanted to recognize the Harrison family’s support, for this and really all of the philanthropic work they’ve done in the city,” LaVere said. “They really are one of our great corporate partners here, and this is going to be really a huge catalyst in getting this playground rebuilt.”

In a brief video played after LaVere’s remarks, Myron, Ralph and Jim Harrison acknowledged the city’s thanks. “To be involved in Arroyo Verde Park makes us all very happy,” Myron said. “All of our kids played baseball there. I used to ride up there on my bicycle all the time, myself and my wife, so to get to do this event with the city of Ventura, we’re really happy to be involved.” (See video here.)

For more information on the playground rebuild and opportunities to help, visit venturafoundation.org.

Gold Coast Sets the Gold Standard in Recycling and Business

Gold Coast Sets the Gold Standard in Recycling and Business

We owe the highest of praise to our remarkable partner Gold Coast Recycling. Through some of the toughest times in its 30-plus years in business, the Ventura recycling company has stood strong and robust.

Over the past several years of a global downturn in the recycling market, led by China no longer accepting our goods, Gold Coast has powered through, finding new markets regionally and around the world for all the recyclable goods you put in your carts. And over the past year since the pandemic hit, the facility is one of the few places that’s remained open every day, taking every safety precaution for its employees and the public.

Thank you for your support. Keep on doing what you’re doing: Keep your recyclables clean and loose in your carts. And most importantly, don’t stop recycling!

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