Reuse Advocacy in Action

Oct 9

Reuse program examples from around the country

Throughout 2024, Upstream held a series of convenings for reuse advocates living in states and provinces where decision makers hold more conservative values and it can be difficult to pass reuse policy. Together, they shared insights, ideas, and troubleshooting techniques around creative ways to advance reuse in their areas. One point of discussion was the various reuse programs and strategies that can be implemented on-the-ground. The insights shared here could prove helpful for anyone trying to engage their community.

Jennifer Wendt of Mississippi River City & Towns Initiative, Amanda Jordan from the City of Phoenix, and Crystal Dreisbach, who founded Don’t Waste Durham in Durham, NC, shared their experiences and insights into the actions they were able to take given the demographics of each of their regions.

Implementing Change Without Policy:

Showing the drain on resources that single-use causes states and municipalities can provide tangibility to the concept of reuse. Single-use shopping bags, for instance, not only affect the environment but the local economy, in terms of waste management, stream cleanup, bags clogging recycling machinery, and other externalities. Don’t Waste Durham made this case to community members and took the shorter route than pushing for a single-use bag ban: they amassed volunteers to sew reusable bags that they handed out to shoppers around the city.
Encouraging and educating around water refill — turning to old fashioned water fountains rather than relying on single-use plastic bottles — offers “low hanging fruit” that helps normalize a reuse practice when policy is a sticky issue.
Supporting schools and schoolchildren can be a great entry point for reuse in a community, since it is better for children’s health and saves money. Schools are large volume, closed loop venues, which are the most scalable form of reuse system.
Public grants can encourage reuse when policy can not. For example, the Arizona DEQ runs a program in which the taxes collected from landfill tipping fees are allocated toward a grant award focused on research and development, waste reduction assistance, equipment, technology, and education.

Working at the City Level:

Don’t Waste Durham learned the importance of partnership early on when they involved the health department in their conversations years in advance of building a wash facility for reusables. They co-designed the facility and wash protocols, and as a result the health department advocated for changes to the NC food code at the state level, to allow for reusables.
When grassroots champions in conservative states can collaborate with local governments, their voices can be amplified exponentially. The Mississippi River Cities & Towns Initiative offers a strong example: once groups plug in with the mayor in their own town, this regional mayors’ convening can help move the needle all along the River corridor.
The City of Phoenix oversees waste management for the airport, Convention Center, and public schools, among other locales. Though they cannot require these locations to go reusable, they can encourage and educate them. The city itself has a sustainable purchasing policy that encourages procurement officers to seek out covered, recycled or reusable materials.
In the state of Arizona, policy is not always a key driver—but economic development is. Reuse Phoenix advocates work with entities like the Greater Phoenix Economic Council, which has a dedicated business attraction and development team focused on circular economy and clean tech solutions.

Learn! Data Collection, Education & Outreach

Data collection is a good starting point for any initiative. When MRCTI started the Mississippi River Plastic Pollution Initiative with the United Nations and the University of Georgia, they began by collecting litter data, using a marine debris tracker phone app.
The conclusions from this volunteer collection effort illustrated the need to control litter, which directly led to the call for an anti-litter campaign. From there, people became more engaged and started looking at single-use in a different light and at reuse and refill as a solution.
The Zero Waste Team within the Phoenix Department of Public Works focuses on waste reduction education and outreach, and they are increasingly messaging around reuse, not just recycling and behavior change.

Teaming Up

Reaching out starts with coming together, which is what so many volunteers and NGO coalitions have done across the US & Canada, forming reuse groups to activate change in their communities. Phoenix is a recent such example. Engaged community members began by ideating pilots they could collaborate around to demonstrate to city- and state-level leadership the value and necessity of reuse systems. They also work strategically throughout the region with other reuse groups, such as the US Plastics Pact’s Reuse Catalyst Program, C40 Cities, and the West Coast Government Reuse System. The more cross-pollination of ideas and resources, the more likely a program is to succeed and scale.
Don’t Waste Durham was “designed by the people, for the people.” Concerned community members came together in an open-to-all format to envision what reuse could look like in their city, based on the needs and concerns of the citizens and what would work politically.
Along the Mississippi River Corridor, several dozen public and private organizations partnered with MRCTI on the Mississippi River Plastic Pollution Initiative. They were able to launch projects in each participating municipality, sending a ripple effect throughout the region.