Start your spring cleaning with Giveaway Day

With the sun finally warming our days here in Kingston, it’s that time of year when residents are opening their windows, rearranging their homes for the coming season, and trying to de-clutter – the perfect time for Giveaway Day!

At least twice a year, the City of Kingston holds Giveaway Day, a day where residents are welcome to put items out at the roadside for others to pick up for free. At the same time, residents are encouraged to pick up items they see on Giveaway Day that they have a home for. There are many items people no longer have a use for in their own homes that still have life left in them, explains Heather Roberts, director of solid waste for the City of Kingston.

“Giveaway Days are one of the many tools we have to help keep items out of landfill. If an object can be reused or repurposed, then it truly is not garbage. Please make use of Giveaway Days to help Kingston reach its goal to divert 65 per cent of its household waste from landfill by 2025,” Roberts said.

The City is encouraging Giveaway Day participants to share photos of their Giveaway Day items on Twitter with the hashtag #WasteNotYGK. This way, others will be able to peruse items being given away easily online.

The following is a list of Giveaway Day guidelines from the City:

Only set out appropriate items that you know someone else might want.

• Appropriate: books, CDs, DVDs, furniture and small appliances, electronics, construction materials (including drywall, lumber, hardware), kitchen gadgets, dishes, cutlery, pots and pans and, yes, unwanted gifts.
• Inappropriate: the Consumer Product Safety Bureau of Health Canada advises that these items should not be given away (or picked-up): baby walkers, cribs, car seats, strollers, playpens, bath seats, mattresses, blinds and toys.

How to put items out:

• Place items at the curb in front of your home.
• Place stickers or signs on the items with the word ‘FREE.’
• Ensure any items that you do not want taken are kept away from items placed at the curb.
• At the end of the day, bring any uncollected items back in to your home. The City will not collect unwanted items left at the curb. Consider donating them to a local charity.

How to pick items up:

• Respect other people’s property: don’t walk on people’s lawns or gardens.
• Take only the items marked ‘FREE’ and placed at the curb.
• Don’t leave previously picked up items on the curb at other people’s property.

This is also the time of year that the City’s hazardous waste facility opens for the season. Having opened yesterday on Thursday, Apr. 4, 2019, the facility – located at the Kingston Area Recycling Centre at 196 Lappan’s Lane – is now open from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. every Thursday, and from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. every Saturday until November 2019.

Residents must bring proof of residency (i.e. a driver’s licence) when dropping off household hazardous waste.  For reporting purposes, the City of Kingston tracks whether facility visitors are from Kingston or another nearby community.

Additionally, certain household hazardous waste items can be dropped off at other locations.

• Compact fluorescent light bulbs contain mercury and are hazardous waste. They can be brought to the household hazardous waste facility or the KARC administrative office.
• Batteries may be dropped off at City Hall, 216 Ontario St.; the INVISTA Centre, 1350 Gardiners Rd.; KARC, 196 Lappan’s Lane; or see www.call2recycle.org or www.rawmaterials.com for battery recycling drop-off locations.
• Expired or unused pharmaceuticals and your needles:  www.healthsteward.ca/returns/ontario.  If you find a needle, do not touch it. Contact KFL&A Public Health via the Street Health Centre at 613-549-1440 to report its location.
• See www.makethedrop.ca or www.Regeneration.ca to find a list of retailers that take some household hazardous waste items.

For more information on how to get rid of unneeded items while diverting them from landfill from the City, click here.