BREWER, Maine — Six years ago, the city’s finance director said the reason Brewer was implementing a controversial pay-as-you-throw program and zero-sort recycling was to reduce costs associated with sending trash to Penobscot Energy Recovery Co. in Orrington in anticipation of prices doubling after 2018.

Saco, Maine – Feb. 29, 2016 – The city of Brewer, Maine, has saved $370,000 in disposal fees at the five-year anniversary of its pay-as-you-throw (PAYT) waste reduction and recycling program. The city has also cut its residential solid waste collected curbside in half and increased its recycling rate nearly six-fold, according to new figures released by the city.

BREWER, Maine — Someone interested in opening a new restaurant and retail shop on the South Main Street lot where the city’s old public safety building once stood has purchased the vacant parcel.

BREWER, Maine — Robert Thompson started using opiates illegally when he was a teenager, he said. When he hit 30 and was in the middle of losing everything — his children, his job, his apartment — all doors seemed closed to him.

BREWER, Maine — The Village Centre apartments are being built to such strict standards of energy efficiency that the builders expect some tenants will not have to turn on their heat next winter.

BREWER, Maine — The city is preparing for phase two of its waterfront trail system, which will extend the 1,900-foot path from its current ending at the Chamberlain Bridge upriver to the Penobscot Bridge, and will add two new, stone chess tables to get things started.

BREWER, Maine — A new brewery-restaurant is under construction at the site where the old Public Works garage on Hardy Street once stood, and it is scheduled to open at the end of April, a city official said Wednesday.

BREWER, Maine — City leaders took a leap of faith Tuesday night when they unanimously approved signing a 15-year contract to send waste to the Municipal Review Committee’s planned trash-to-energy facility in Hampden starting in 2018.

The odd Jan. 6 Bangor Daily News OpEd about trash disposal completely mischaracterizes pay-as-you-throw programs, which are a fair and equitable way to increase recycling and reduce waste. Brewer recently marked the five-year anniversary of its pay-as-you-throw program, which, since its inception in 2011, has resulted in a 370 percent increase in residential recycling and a more than 50 percent decrease in trash the city sends to Penobscot Energy Recovery Co.

BREWER, Maine — Marie Allen likely never planned to become an anti-drug crusader, but she felt compelled to do so after losing her daughter, Erin, to a heroin overdose.