Manager of Waste and Recycling Erica Speigel said that she was pleased with the Davis Center recycling program results in the 2009-2010 annual report. In the most recent data collection, 61.7 percent of waste materials were diverted from the landfill through recycling and composting efforts at Davis, Spiegel said. “The waste diversion efforts at Davis have steadily improved since the building’s opening in the fall of 2007,” she said. A total of 56.25 tons of materials were recycled, including corrugated cardboard, mixed paper, glass and plastic bottles and metal cans, according to statistics from the Physical Plant Department. Speigel said that one of the main causes of the success is that a stronger emphasis is placed on creating less waste material in the first place. Reduce and reuse, even before you recycle, she said. “UVM used to print its own phone book that was given out to all staff, faculty and students,” Speigel said. “We’d recycle the phone books, seven tons of them, at the end of the year. In 2009, UVM stopped printing the books entirely, completely avoiding 7 tons of paper in the first place.”