If you want to know about recycling and solid waste management, Peggy Grayson is your go-to in Genesee County.
Just ask her a question. But be prepared because Grayson’s enthusiasm on the topic can take a while. And it’s that zeal that’s kept her in place as the county’s recycling administrator for the GLOW Region Solid Waste Management Committee for nearly two dozen years.
“It's been interesting, there are good times. The state is not as fun to deal with, but, you know, it's been fun. I'll miss the talking to people and things like that. I'm sure I'll still get stopped in the grocery stores, which is fine. It's kind of a hard habit to break,” she said of preparing for her impending retirement on June 30. “I'll still have my little sculptures made out of spoons and forks and stuff, and used clothing is a big thing with me.”
During her interview Friday at County Building 2 with The Batavian, the more she thought about interesting moments on the job, the more of them came flooding back. There's a recycling hotline that comes into her department, and Grayson takes -- and remembers -- the calls.
Like the time, right around the end of a school day, when someone called to ask if dental floss was recyclable. She gathered it wasn’t a serious question and that she was being pranked, so it made for a giggle.
Or the more serious time when a mom called wondering what to do with a bottle of some type of sodium material in oil that could explode if it came in contact with water. Her now-deceased son obtained it from a teacher and had kept it in the family refrigerator. So what should the mom do with it now? Grayson had to call a couple of resources to find the safest answer.
Or when a man called to say that he had all of the chemical ingredients to make fireworks and wanted to dispose of them. Grayson had to provide instructions to him for where to take them and follow up to ensure they were properly taken care of at an equipped county disposal site.
And then there were calls about cooking oil. And used paint. Box-style televisions. K-cups. Vaping cartridges, which is a newer item. Calls from Texas to a credit union with a phone number that’s just one number off the county’s, which sometimes ends up in a conversation about the weather “up there.”
Or calls about the items that folks just throw in those blue recycling boxes, thinking that anything will get recycled, including takeout containers with food inside. Or bags filled with dog poop (yes, true story, Grayson swears).
And when it’s not about matters legitimately pertaining to her department, it’s about something that’s a close second.
“I take calls every day, they think we’re a waste management company,” she said. “People constantly call. I was asked about cow mats. They are filled with tire chips, I’ve never heard of them. They wanted to know how to dispose of them. I tell people, ‘well, we use this stuff, but then we don’t want to get rid of it.’”
Apparently, that caller wasn’t so keen on having to pay for the disposal of his cow mats. Grayson said that, yes, there are items that you just can’t recycle and may have to pay to get rid of.
One may have thought that the recyclable and solid waste management field was a dry and boring one, right? Not for Grayson, who has plenty to tell her successor once hired. Applications are due April 7, and funds have been approved for her to train that person until she leaves.
A former teacher at the now-defunct St Anthony’s School in Batavia, Grayson has enjoyed the Conservation Field Days and Kinder Farming of her current job since they involve students. That allowed her “to teach and didn’t have to do the discipline,” she said. It put her bachelor’s in English from Geneseo State College to good use for two years before she opted to move on to selling real estate before pursuing a solid waste management tech and education degree at Rochester Institute of Technology.
“I originally thought I’d work for the DEC,” she said. “This job came open in August 1996. I got out of teaching, but I have used a lot of the teaching skills.”
Grayson sat at a table with plastic composters stacked beneath, waiting for an upcoming event. On top of the table sat a box for recycling phones and batteries, and walls were lined with posters about events and information regarding, you guessed it, recycling.
The department wasn’t expected to survive six months, she said, and “here it’s been 34 years.” If you’re a regular at recycling events — household hazardous waste collections, for one, you probably have seen or spoken to Grayson, who has been a regular at such events. In fact, she has already committed to volunteering for this year’s collection and has arranged the paint collection, electronics and composting events.
Margaret "Peggy" Grayson lives in Stafford. She raises sunflowers and gardens in grow boxes, planting cucumbers, beans, red peppers, small pumpkins and other veggies that pique her interest. She uses technology at work but has resisted it at home, she said. That means no Internet.
What does she have ready for her new trainee? Some apt advice.
“Treat your volunteers good. We feed them,” Grayson said. “I make cookies, they’ll have to take over my cooking duties, and attend the fairs … you’ll see people there you’ll never see the rest of the year.”
Top Photo of Peggy Grayson with a piece of artwork made by a Boy Scout troop depicting a recycling scene, and above, Grayson with a composter. Photos by Joanne Beck.
