Monroe County residents on Wednesday will have one last opportunity in 2022 to recycle unwanted passenger vehicle tires for free.

The recycling program being offered by the Monroe County Recycling & Green Community Program and the Monroe County Drain Commission will hold its final collection Wednesday, July 27 at the Monroe County Drain Commission Office, 1005 South Raisinville Road, Monroe.

The site will be open from 9 a.m. to noon or until the trailer is full. These dates and hours are the only times that tires can be left at the site. Tires will not be accepted at any other time and leaving tires after hours is illegal dumping, which is a punishable offense.

Participants are allowed to bring up to 10 tires and collected tires will be recycled at no charge. All tires are preferred clean and off the rim. Only passenger vehicle or light truck tires will be accepted. This program is for Monroe County residents only. Tires from commercial sources will not be accepted.

Proper disposal of tires is essential for the health and safety of you and the environment. Piles of scrap tires are a breeding ground for mosquitoes and other pests and are also a serious fire hazard. Tires collected at the event will be recycled into materials such as playground and landscape applications, rubberized asphalt road projects, in-fill material for synthetic athletic fields, and rubber chips for septic fields and other engineered projects. Residents are encouraged to dispose of old tires when purchasing new tires at the retailer. Over 51,525 tires have been recycled from these events since 2015.

“The tire recycling program is a great resource for our community. By providing residents a free and easy way to properly dispose of old tires, this program helps address illegal dumping in our county drains and ditches which can create mosquito breeding zones, a serious public health concern,” said Monroe County Drain Commissioner David Thompson and Kim Comerzan, Monroe County Health Officer/ Director, in a joint statement.

This program is funded by a grant from the Scrap Tire Cleanup Project through The Michigan Department of Environment, Great Lakes, and Energy (EGLE) and the County of Monroe.

For more information on the Recycling and Green Community Programs please contact Dan Rock at (734) 240-7909 or Dan_Rock@monroemi.org.