TOWN NAME, Mass. - The City of Worcester is beginning to map out goals for a cleaner future with the recently-announced Zero Waste Master Plan, and project leaders are looking for feedback from residents and businesses throughout the city.

The Zero Waste Master Plan stems from the 2021 Green Worcester Plan, and will eventually serve as a roadmap to prevent and reduce waste throughout the city.

Programs and strategies being explored and studied include the efficacy of the current residential ‘Pay-As-You-Throw’ yellow bag program, opportunities for food scraps composting, and new approaches to reduce illegal dumping and littering.

On Wednesday, Miranda Hotham, Worcester’s Zero Waste Coordinator, joined local business leaders at the Worcester Regional Chamber of Commerce for a listening session.

“We live on a finite earth where we’re not getting any more space or land, but we’re still producing more and more trash,” Hotham said. “So we really need a longterm solution so that we’re no longer sending things to the landfill.”

Before any sort of step-by-step plan can take shape, Hotham and others involved in the project want a complete understanding of the day-to-day travel of trash throughout the city.

Consultants working with the city are in the midst of collecting nearly 11 tons of randomly-selected trash samples to sort and analyze it.

“First, we’re going to be taking inventory of all of our current waste that we have,” Hotham said. “Understanding the composition of Worcester’s waste streams, and then we’re going to be coming up with actionable solutions for diversion in the future.”

The Worcester Green Corps has also been involved in the plan, and Coordinator Amelia Tieri hopes in addition to bringing awareness to issues like littering and illegal dumping, these longstanding issues could be tackled in a major way.

“Illegal dumping is a big issue in the city and I would definitely like to see a reduction in the amount of places we’re seeing that,” Tieri said. “I would also just like to see more public trash cans so people have options for where they can dispose of their things.”

The Zero Waste Master Plan won’t be completed until early 2026, but the months ahead will present several opportunities for the public to get involved with several workshops. People can also fill out the Worcester Waste Survey here. The results will help shape programs, policies and services.