Mill Run Elementary School now has a compost program! Every Wednesday, we collect food waste from the cafeteria and place it in the compost bin on school grounds. After a layer of food waste, we spread a layer of wood chips kindly donated by Flint Anderson, at Tree Life. After 2 weeks, we have composted about 140 pounds of food waste. The students really enjoy being a part of the process and are very excited for the program.

The Broadlands HOA voted to not allow us to create a community composting program. So now we are creating a plan to create a program at our local elementary school, Mill Run. The school already has a wooden compost bin that we will be able to use. Our proposal includes ways that students can be involved as well as how they can incorporate the science of composting into their curriculum.

We are presenting a proposal to the Broadlands HOA Board on Tuesday, April 13th to get approval for a community composting program.

The purpose of the Broadlands Community Composting Project is to create a composting program for the Broadlands and surrounding communities in order to reduce waste brought to landfills, thereby decreasing greenhouse gas emissions. We will begin by providing collection kits to residents to collect compostable materials. The residents can then bring their waste to one or more collection bins in the Broadlands community. Next, a composting company will collect the waste and bring it to their facility where it will be composted.

The seed funding from ChangeX will be used for the compost collection kits that will be provided to residents and for the fees associated with collection and composting of the waste by the composting company.

During the COVID pandemic, we will be sure to use safety precautions to reduce the risk of spreading the virus. Most of our work involving composting and collection will take place outside. Members will always wear masks when with the group. Meetings will either be held virtually or outside with proper social distancing.

This composting project will help our community be providing hands-on education about the environmental benefits of composting. It will also decrease the amount of waste that will be disposed of in landfills, thus decreasing reducing greenhouse gas emissions. This project could also be and integral part of the update to the Loudoun County Community Energy Strategy.

Screen shot of kick-off meeting held 11/11/2020

Hi! I stumbled across this group and love what you're up to. I hope you don't mind if I follow your group for a while to see how I can apply this to my own neighborhood (near South Riding). Our neighbors routinely discard their yard scraps, old pumpkins, and leftover food near the edge of the forest and I'd love to get them to throw them into a compost pile/container instead. :)