ASHLAND – It was drizzling at 8 a.m. Monday when Sandra Tunnell arrived at the Ashland County Fairgrounds.
Aside from the livestock barns, where students and families were already feeding and grooming their animals, the fairgrounds was mostly desolate.
Tunnell is among a small but dedicated group of volunteers working to make sure recycling is available throughout fair week.
Grabbing the key to an Ashland County Sheriff’s Office utility vehicle from chief deputy Carl Richert, Tunnell took the wheel of the Kubota and began driving around the fairgrounds. Whenever she found a nearly-full bag on one of the blue recycling stands set up throughout the grounds, she loaded it up on the back of the vehicle and replaced it with a new bag.
It took just half an hour, but Tunnell felt she’d made a difference.
Volunteers took over the recycling efforts at the fair about four years ago, after Ashland resident Nancy Wasen learned the county would no longer provide the service.
The idea of all those bottles and cans going into a landfill bothered Wasen, who since the 1970s has adhered to a philosophy she read in an advertisement, “Never throw anything away. There is no away.”
Wasen called Tunnell, who was Wasen’s councilwoman at the time.
“I knew Sandra well enough by then to know something would happen if I called her,” Wasen said. “I figured I would be involved in some way, but I didn’t know Sandra would actually be doing it.”
Tunnell made a few calls and learned the city services department could provide stands and bags and pick up the recycling. The sheriff’s office would provide the vehicle. All that was needed was manpower.
Now, Wasen and Tunnell arrange volunteers to set up and tear down the bins before and after the fair as well as to replace bags each morning before the gates open. Some volunteers bring their kids to show them the value of recycling and community service.
“You’re only one person, but if you band together with other like-minded people, you can change the world,” Wasen said.
