Debra Misner stared in awe at the pile of banana peels, wilting lettuce, chicken bones and pizza boxes in her driveway.
“I’m amazed at how much food we throw away,” said the Sycamore neighborhood resident. “I had never composted my food before for fear of bears and fruit flies and all sorts of stuff. I overbuy, I overcook and I throw everything away. I hate to think how much I’ve put in the landfills up until now.”
On Wednesday, Misner, along with nine of her neighbors, completed a four-week long project with King County Solid Waste Department as part of its “Recyle More, It’s Easy to Do,” program.
Since the beginning of August, the 10 Issaquah families collected their food scraps and food soiled paper in small bins. They were weighed weekly by county representatives, who estimated a final count of more than 400 pounds.
“What we’re trying to do today is to illustrate to folks how easy it is to recycle their food scraps and their food soiled paper,” said King County EcoConsumer Tom Watson, standing atop a heap of waste. “We are showing the circle of life, how food scraps don’t need to go in the garbage.”
Watson said nearly 30 percent of what people throw away is comprised of food scraps or soiled paper. He noted the average family throws away more than 450 pounds a year.
Watson said there are a wide range of items that can be placed in the yard recycle bins — many that people aren’t aware of. Everything from delivery pizza boxes, non-wax paper plates and paper towels that haven’t been used to clean up chemicals are on the list.
After Wednesday’s brief celebration involving Issaquah Mayor Ava Frisinger and several other community members, the food waste was sent off to Cedar Grove Composting. Over the next 12 weeks it will go through a breakdown process before it is donated to the Issaquah Flatland Community Garden. The garden is sponsored by AtWork!, which helps people with disabilities integrated in their communities. Twenty-five percent of the garden’s beds are collaboratively worked on by garden members with the harvest donated to the Issaquah Food Bank.
“We are the beneficiary of the compost which will grow a whole new crop of food,” said Dennis Wajda, of AtWork! “Getting this gift is going to be wonderful.”
For Issaquah residents like Misner, the experiment was eye-opening. Her concerns of fruit flies were put to rest by a filter in her scrap container. To avoid bears she simply stores her waste in her garage until it’s time to take it out. And to top it off, there’s little, to no odor.
“I was surprised how easy it was,” she said.
For more information on exactly residents are encouraged to contact their waste haulers, or go to, www.kingcounty.gov/recyclemore.
