PONDER — Bring the Betty Foster Library your tired, your poor and your huddled masses of paper, yearning to be recycled.

But the cardboard refuse and homeless phone books?

Recycle those elsewhere, at least for now.

DRC/Barron Ludlum

Tanya Ochoa, city librarian, helped get the new paper recycling bins that were placed behind the Betty Foster Library in Ponder.

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Ponder officials took a small, return step toward citywide recycling this month; two large recycle bins were delivered Friday to the west side of Town Hall, 405 Schaffner St.

Town leaders gave up on community recycle bins because people overwhelmed them with trash.

Abitibi Paper Retriever will pay Ponder for each ton of paper collected, and the city has agreed that proceeds from paper left in those bins will benefit the library.

When the town secretary first suggested paper recycling, city librarian Tanya Ochoa said she wasn’t sure how much the library budget could benefit. But after doing a little math, she realized recycling could nearly double the budget for buying new books.

“It could be helpful,” Ochoa said.

Currently, the library has about $2,500 to spend each year, which buys about 500 books. Inspirational books and mystery fiction are popular with the library’s 1,240 registered patrons. Ochoa would also like to update the library’s juvenile nonfiction collection. In addition, several library computers need upgrades, and the computer area has room for one more workstation.

Ochoa and others at Town Hall knew the bins were coming and took advantage of that to do some housekeeping.

Several on the town staff helped clean out the public works office, throwing out many old construction documents, Secretary Sheri Clearman said. As a result, one recycle bin is nearly full already. The staff arranged the remaining drawings in flat file drawers donated to Ponder by the Denton Central Appraisal District.

“It’s so organized in there now, our public works director can’t find anything,” Clearman said.

Ponder resident Barb Hunter lobbied for more than a year to get recycling back in the town.

She said she was happy the bins were back.

“It’s a start,” she said.

PEGGY HEINKEL-WOLFE can be reached at 940-566-6881. Her e-mail address is pheinkel-wolfe@dentonrc.com .