With spring and milder weather also comes the Freeborn County Household Hazardous Waste Collection program. Over the past six years we have always started in April and ended in September, and our first collection this year will be in the city of Freeborn on April 30. From Freeborn we move on to the city of Conger on May 7, and the first collection for Albert Lea will be on May 10. We will hold five collections in Albert Lea, the last one being September 13.

Hopefully you found the Household Hazardous Waste collection schedule in the &uot;Freeborn County TIMES&uot; magazine that was mailed to everyone in the county. We have placed extra copies of the schedule in banks, post offices and other stores throughout the county if you missed yours.

The hazardous waste program has depended heavily on volunteer help over the years. We have people of all ages and experience help us unload materials from the cars, open cans of paint and pour them into barrels, set up when we get to the site and cleanup after we are done. We have to be prepared to react if something is spilled or a container leaks, and we are required by state regulations to package our waste in a safe manner for transportation. While the operation looks simple, a lot of time is spent planning and recruiting, making the stop quick and easy for our residents. Thank you, thank you, to all of you who have helped us in the past. The individual names and service organizations of those people were listed in the latest issue of our &uot;TIMES&uot; magazine.

We will also accept old eyeglasses and hearing aids at our hazardous waste collections. We have a collection box provided by the Lions Club and everything we collect goes to the Recycle For Sight program.

There are other events we would like to promote this year. One is a change in the Minnesota Department of Agriculture pesticide collection program. There will not be an ag chemical collection here, but farmers who wish to dispose of old or unwanted chemicals should mark their calendars for the regional collection to be held at the Ellendale Co-Op on June 24 from 2-5 p.m. If you miss this collection, there may not be another collection for at least two years.

Another collection this year will be for electronics. If you have an old computer, television, copy machine, etc. we will hold a one-time collection at the fairgrounds on Thursday, May 22 from 10 a.m.-noon. There will be a charge of $10 for each unit brought to us. These electronic units will be shipped to the Waste Management recycling facility in Minneapolis. The dismantled parts will be recycled, and no units will be sent to other countries for disassembly like the nasty pollution stories we have seen on TV. We will accept electronics from anyone, but this program is focusing on commercial businesses.

If your service club, church organization, or Boy Scout troop would like to do a community service project, or if you just want to help, give us a call and come to one of our collections. We have gloves and other protective equipment available and I can promise you an eye-opening experience when you see all the waste we dispose of at a collection.

Randy Tuchtenhagen is head of the Freeborn County Environmental Services department.