Alicia Neppl, recycling coordinator for the city of Conway, said her new job is less stressful than her previous one in health education.
Before she started trying to save the Earth, she was trying to save lives.
“I find it’s a lot easier to get people to recycle than to quit smoking,” she said with a laugh.
Neppl — pronounced Nep-pul — started as recycling coordinator in February and had a pretty big learning curve.
“Oh, definitely,” she said. Neppl credited Joe Hopper, director of the Conway Sanitation Department, and her co-workers for helping her acclimate to the world of recycling.
Neppl, a 31-year-old Little Rock native, graduated from Mount St. Mary Academy and came to the University of Central Arkansas in Conway, undecided about her future.
“Not many people went to college in my family; I’m one of the first on my mom’s side to graduate. I wanted to do something where I could make a difference. Everybody has that goal that they want to do something and be remembered for something.”
She graduated in 2009 with a degree in health education.
“It was just an education thing; I wanted to educate people about how to be healthy,” she said. “When you go in that field, there are lots of ways you can go — mental health, physical health. … I found my place basically out in the community in the schools.”
Her required internship in the UCA health-education program was in the Conway office of Community Service Inc., a nonprofit organization that serves 11 counties.
She was a prevention specialist and wrote grants and performed outreach education for the public, emphasizing prevention of prescription-drug, alcohol and tobacco abuse, she said. One of the grants she received allowed her to work on-site in the East End School District in Bigelow, where she coordinated a school health grant.
Neppl said 90 percent of what she did in the school district was related to tobacco.
“We had a youth-led group to help kids never start, or stop, tobacco. The tobacco rates at the school went way down, especially the smokeless. There are more smokeless-tobacco users in the county.”
In 2013, Neppl got a job as a health program specialist for the Arkansas Department of Health, funded with the same grant that put her in the Bigelow school. Her responsibilities were primarily tobacco-cessation efforts.
“The job I had before put me at the grassroots level, and this was at the state level,”
she said. Neppl helped manage statewide and community grants.
“My main job was to try to stay ahead of the big tobacco companies,” she said. Neppl searched for new products that would entice users.
“All the vaping products — big tobacco, they’re purchasing them. They’re marketing and advertising. … They know how to get their audience. If their customers are dying from use, they need new customers. They’re always targeting the youth.”
Although her job was rewarding, driving back and forth from Conway to
Little Rock was time-consuming and took time away from her husband, A.J., and their two daughters, Maci, 5, and Natalie, 2.
“I kept trying to find something closer to home; there are not a lot of jobs [for] my background,” she said.
When she saw the opening for the city’s recycling coordinator, “I was like, ‘You know, I think I’m going to go for it,’” she said.
The only similarity to her previous jobs, she said, is that “recycling is a public-health service, and I’ve been in that public-health realm since I graduated.”
Former city recycling coordinator Angie Howard also served in the position for the Faulkner County Solid Waste District, but the positions have been separated. Jack Bell, chief of staff for the city of Conway, is recycling coordinator for the solid-waste district.
Hopper said the recycling coordinator’s position was needed “for education and outreach.”
“[Alicia] had really good experience previously with the state Department of Health tobacco-cessation program,” he said. “What was really impressive to me, when she came into her interview, she actually had a portfolio with items she’d helped design.”
He said when the choice came down to “our favorite applicants,” both had to give a demonstration of an outreach program.
Although both did well, “overall, she caught our attention,” Hopper said of Neppl.
Neppl “hit the ground running,” he said.
“She started in February, and oh, my, goodness; I know we had a lot of folks come through here in March or April, and I know she was doing a lot of presentations,” he said.
Conway’s recycling program is well-respected, Neppl said.
“We have probably one of the best in the state. Not many [cities] do curbside recycling. We can put it all in one bin; our machine and our employees sort it out.”
In 1994, Conway residents approved a $1 million bond issue to build the Material Recovery Facility.
Residents may recycle cardboard, paper, plastics Nos. 1-7, metal cans and Styrofoam.
“Styrofoam is pretty big. Not everybody who does recycling like we do does Styrofoam, and we do,” she said.
Glass recycling is available, and a separate container is provided for curbside pickup.
“We should never put glass in the recycling blue bin. Unfortunately, people are, and our employees are getting hurt by this. We’re trying to get the word out about that,” she said.
Glass prescription bottles and medical waste are problems for the workers.
“We still have an issue with the sharps and the needles. Our employees are getting pricked with those, getting cut with the glass,” she said.
Neppl said many residents use needles for insulin, for example. She suggested that residents put used needles in plastic laundry-detergent bottles, “label it as sharps, and throw it in your green garbage.
“One, my biggest job to do is to educate the proper ways to recycle,” she said. “Every program has different sets of rules in what we can take and what we can’t. Pretty much, I learn something new every day.”
Neppl goes into schools to teach students about recycling, and she gives tours of the Material Recovery Facility for schools, churches and other groups.
“The kids definitely learn a lot, even the parents. I think they’re just in awe when they see our machine,” Neppl said. Once the Conway Sanitation Department picks up the recycling at the curb, people don’t really know what happens to it, she said.
The recycled material is sold to the highest bidder.
“Some of our plastics, they take it and turn it into carpet and clothing, … plastic rubber ties,” she said. “Our Styrofoam, … it goes to make new toys and crown molding. It’s really great; we take all these products and make new ones.
“My kids, I always have to put it in perspective for them. … [We get] 250 tons of trash or waste a day at our landfill. That’s like burying eight garbage trucks a day; it’s a lot,” she said. The sanitation department picks up 5,000 tons of recycling and 5,000 tons of yard waste a week.
“That’s 10,000 tons of diversion from the landfill,” Neppl said.
Summer is a downtime for students to come to the recycling center, but some teachers are coming to the center to get professional development, she said.
“Teachers know there’s potential for their students to work in an industry like this because there’s lots of science and math behind it — just the engineering of a landfill,” Neppl said.
“When you hear department of sanitation, … people have negative perceptions just because of what we do,” she said.
However, solid-waste management is “the first line of defense in public health. Cleanliness must be maintained, or it can lead to death and disease.”
And with her background, Neppl isn’t about to let that happen.
Senior writer Tammy Keith can be reached at (501) 327-0370 or tkeith@arkansasonline.com.