Letter to the Editor: Bedford Would Benefit from Town-Wide Composting

~ Submitted by Elizabeth Knox

Household trash stinks and there’s a lot of it. That smell is the organic material in your household refuse, which makes up 24 percent of what you haul to the curb each week, and 40 percent by weight. So what can we do about it? Can we stop throwing out so much of it and reduce the smell?

There is an alternative. That quarter of your household trash could be composted, keeping the carbon in the soil instead of generating climate-changing greenhouse gas emissions in landfills or incinerators. Backyard composting is quite easy to do. For $45, you can get a covered compost bin from the Bedford DPW. If you alternate double layers of dry leaves / shredded paper with a layer of food waste, it will compost quickly. On the other hand, if you don’t do anything with it at all, it will still turn into rich soil, just a little more slowly!

Though composting is straightforward, some folks are not able to compost their food scraps at their residence. The Bedford chapter of Mothers Out Front, a national organization working for a livable climate for all children, is currently advocating for town-wide composting of food waste for everyone. You can help build momentum on this crucial issue by signing the petition here. Food waste is heavy, so diverting it from the trash stream could help offset the cost of town-subsidized composting through reduced trash tipping fees. If Bedford adopted town-wide composting, we would be joining neighboring towns—Arlington, Lexington, Concord, Cambridge, and Hamilton—that already provide food waste composting to residents.

Providing this climate-friendly service to all residents via curbside composting would promote equity for those who cannot maintain a backyard composter, or for whom a curbside pickup subscription may be cost prohibitive. With a survey last month of resident trash/recycling/composting habits, the Bedford DPW is weighing what’s feasible. In fact, a pilot has already begun to divert food waste created in the kitchens of the high school and middle school. Together, we can really start to make this happen for all of Bedford.

Composting has multiple benefits. It creates healthy soil and more bountiful vegetable gardens, sequesters carbon, helps reduce methane emissions, produces jobs, and even filters and cleans water while reducing runoff. The educational aspect is an additional benefit; school-age children are increasingly aware of the global climate emergency and look for ways they can help the environment close to home. The whole family can be involved in this practice, teaching the value of good climate citizenship, dovetailing with composting practices starting up in the schools.

For all these reasons, Mothers Out Front is urging Bedford Town government to adopt curbside composting for all residents. Those who would like to join the effort can sign this Bedford Mothers Out Front petition in support of composting for all residents.

Correction 7/25/2022: This letter was originally posted with a question mark that was a typo — it should not have been there; The Citizen regrets its error.