HOUGHTON – Houghton will apply for a Department of Environmental Quality grant to get additional recycling containers for the city. 

The $14,900 grant would be matched with $7,000 for the general fund. City Manager Eric Waara said the funds would be used to purchase 300 rolling containers and 10 municipal containers for parks and other public areas.

“We have a stock of some right now,” he said. “It’d be nice to have more to put out.”

The city would still charge residents $10 for the containers, as has been done in previous rounds, Waara said. Giving it away for free would be unfair to people who had paid for the city’s earlier bins, and would also make them value it less, Waara said. 

“If they pay for it, you know they’re intending to use it,” he said.