On Sunday, March 8, at Oheb Shalom, BJEN ran its first (and hopefully not its last) electronic recycling program. Using the services of CDM recycling, we offered to take “anything with a plug” that you no longer wanted. The idea is to get that volume of trash out of the landfill, the toxins safely removed and tucked away, and save money for all of us (landfill management costs taxpayers money).

Thank you to all 150+ who participated in this remarkable day. We are still waiting for a final accounting from CDM about the volume we collected, but as you can see from the photo attached - which is just what we collected in the first hour or so - we were all overwhelmed by the turnout. It took two large (!) trucks to haul it all away. (The numbers just came in. We collected 20,301 pounds! Ten tons. Extraordinary!)

Thanks to everyone who helped to coordinate this, and to all our synagogue liaisons who got the word out!

Special thanks go to Audrey Rothschild, who spearheaded this project and whose organizational skills helped it run as smoothly as it did; and thanks to our volunteers who guided traffic and unloaded trunks and generall kept things in such good humor: Stuart Stainman, Donna Brown (and her gracious daughter), Larry Kloze and especially Sidney Rankin! And many thanks to Oheb Shalom (Rabbi Fink and Syn Exec Ken Davidson) for allowing us to use their outdoors during a most busy time of the year. Thanks to Joan Plisko for the suggestion to do this!

With the help of all you, we kept tons of dangerous and reusable waste out of our landfills.

One thing we learned for next time. Many of the items we collected still worked. Some were so outdated that very few people would find them useful. But other items, such as fans, clock radios, cassette players, etc. some folks might like to have. So, we had a few folks scavenge for goodies among the piles. And that was fine too! So next time, we are considering dividing our piles into two: the broken and the still-working, and invite you to come both to give and possibly to receive!

We will get back to you with information when we do this again.

Meanwhile, when does April 8th come only once every 28 years? This year! when it is also Birkat Hahammah.  For information about this rare event, Blessing of the Sun - Birkat Hahammah, the every-28-year,  thrice in a lifetime experience (if we are blessed with length of years),  check out BJEN’s website http://www.bjen.org and http://www.blessthesun.org.

And join us at sunrise at Pearlstone for a not-to-be-forgotten experience!