UNION, NE (September 17, 2010) – The entire town of Union, Nebraska spent the weekend cleaning up their community and becoming a “green” eco-friendlier place to live with the support of Union United, Inc., a grant from the Nebraska Department of Environmental Quality (NDEQ), and Flings Pop-Up Recycle Bins.Union, Nebraska, located between Lincoln and Omaha, is a quiet town comprised of 108 households that truly reflects its motto, “A Home is in the Heartland”. As is true with many smaller communities throughout America, it provides a sense of community not found in large metro areas, but often does not have the municipal initiatives of large cities.The idea to green up the town was started by Mindy Chipman, a recent resident to Union. “When we moved to Union, we were surprised to find that there was no recycling program of any kind in place,” explains Mindy. “It’s not that the town doesn’t care about the environment and the citizens aren’t active. We’re very proud to be selected to be one of three communities participating in the Nebraska Community Improvement Program (NCIP) Leadership Development Challenge,” adds Mindy. “Union’s participation in NCIP led to the formation of Union United, Inc., an environmentally proactive community improvement group*.”Realizing that every community can make a difference, Mindy started looking into ways to “green up” Union. She applied for and received a grant from the Nebraska Department of Environmental Quality (NDEQ) to provide in-home recycling bins to Union’s residents; joined the efforts to establish a county-wide traveling recycling trailer program; and started planning Union’s Clean Up & Green Up weekend which was held on Saturday, 9/11 and Sunday, 9/12.“Over the weekend, we collected about 160 scrap tires and 300 pounds of electronic-waste; cleaned a 3-mile stretch of Highway 34; removed junk cars; repaired unsafe park equipment; and demolished a dilapidated dangerous shed,” reports Mindy.
“I absolutely LOVE your pop-up recycling containers! I bought two of them weeks ago and love them! I live in a small apartment on the second floor and your product makes it easy. It’s great to be able to have a decent sized recycle bin, but narrow enough for a small apartment kitchen.”
“I can see us pulling [Flings] into the living room to throw wrapping paper in at our next birthday party – or on Christmas morning. Or it would be very easy to flatten it and take it with us if we do a party away from home.”
“How many times have you had a party or cook out and wished you had something other than a large black trash bag or several shopping bags to place trash in? Well, here is your solution… Flings!”
“I am so excited to report that the TX 4000 for Cancer kickoff event, ATLAS, was a huge success! We had a crew of 5 recycling volunteers who spearheaded our recycling effort with Flings in hand. The result was a small U-Haul trailer with a large event’s worth of recyclable materials and an almost empty large trash dumpster (I know this firsthand because I climbed the ladder to throw away the last couple items of the day after we were done cleaning up and it was almost empty!). Flings made recycling easy and very visible to our approximately 1000 guests!”