Due to the overwhelming generosity of the greater Valparaiso community, Pines Village Retirement Communities, Inc. must temporarily suspend accepting clean, recyclable plastic bottle cap donations for their resident-led “Caps for Benches” initiative.

“We are so grateful to the community for their donations,” Pines Village CEO, Laurie Mullet shares. “Together we’ve been able to save nearly 10 tons of plastic from going to local landfills while donating 68 benches and two picnic tables to local nonprofits.”

Pines Village began collecting recyclable plastic caps in 2015. Each bench is constructed of between 200-400 pounds of clean, recycled, plastic caps. All donated caps must be carefully sorted by volunteers (discarding dirty caps, metal of any kind, and non-recyclable materials) as to not damage the recycling equipment.

 After sorting is complete, all clean caps must be delivered to Southern Indiana. Benches then must be picked up and delivered to each recipient in Northwest Indiana.

Pines Village will alert the public when they caught up sorting, processing, and delivering recyclable caps and benches, at which time donations would be accepted again.

If you or a group that you belong to would like to volunteer and assist in our recycling efforts, please contact Lynn Meyers at 219-465-1591.