HAHNVILLE — St. Charles Parish is closing its recycle sites.

Parish officials announced Thursday that St. Charles Government is adopting a new recycling policy due to uncontrolled dumping of non-recyclable items and excessive nonresidential use of the current recycling sites provided by the parish.

The recycling changes took full effect this month.

“We don’t want to discourage residents from recycling,” Parish President Larry Cochran said. “We just want to provide them with a way to recycle that is also cost effective for them.”

In 2018 the parish’s contract monitor began slowly transitioning the parish to the new recycling policy.

This started with the closing of five recycling sites in Montz, Norco, St. Rose, Lakewood Elementary and J.B. Martin Middle School. During the first two weeks of February all sites will be closed as the parish transitions to the two permanent sites at the East and West bank bridge parks.

Residents will notice that the current recycling bins will be replaced with a 25-yard roll off bin that has smaller side sliding doors to encourage proper recycling.

“The excessive dumping was a significant problem for the parish,” Contract Monitor Chandra Sampey said. “The parish was spending unnecessary tax dollars trying to control the dumping. The conditions were getting so bad that the sites were becoming unsanitary due to illegal dumping.

In order to reeducate the residents on what is permissible with the new service agreement, the Contract Monitor’s Office is partnering with The Public Information Office to launch a SCP, Recycle Right Campaign.

“We are hoping this campaign brings awareness and educates the public,” interim Public Officer Adrienne Bourgeois said. “We hope this outreach will not only teach the residents why it is important to recycle the right way, but also shows them how to use the proper outlets correctly.”