Hello Kleen Opener Community!

We really hope that everyone is doing well during this time. So much is changing everyday and we want you to know that the Kleen Opener team is here for you.

We are compiling some resources that you can access if you are social distancing or following your local "Stay at Home" measures. This list may update over time, so bookmark this page and come back for more!

We hope everyone can stay safe during this time.

Support Local

USA Today is organizing a directory of local businesses that need your support during this time of closures. Consider buying a gift card to one of these local businesses.

We are all in this together!

Action Alert: Clean Start Back to Work Tax Credit

Act now to help ensure businesses are properly cleaned and disinfected to help prevent further spread of the novel coronavirus.

The Clean Start: Back to Work Tax Credit would incentivize businesses to properly clean and disinfect their facilities when "stay-at-home" restrictions are lifted, as well as help prevent further infections.

Hygiene Resources for COVID-19

• How to Wash Your Hands: This may seem like something obvious but it is very important to follow the CDC's guidelines for proper hand washing. You would be surprised how your typical hand wash is not enough!
• More Hand Washing Tips and Best Practices
• Social Distancing Best Practices: Make sure to consult your local authorities and government for the most up to date best practices.
• How to Clean Home if Someone is Sick: If you or someone in your household is sick then there are many things you can do to suppress the spread of the virus. These cleaning measures can also be used to prevent spread before someone is sick as well.
• EPA Approved Disinfectants for Use Against COVID-19: "When purchasing a product, check if its EPA registration number is included on this list. If it is, you have a match and the product can be used against SARS-CoV-2. You can find this number on the product label – just look for the EPA Reg. No. These products may be marketed and sold under different brand names, but if they have the same EPA registration number, they are the same product."
• World Health Organization Recommended Hand Sanitizer Formula: Gather supplies to make your own hand rub sanitizer at home.
• Holistic Immune Support Webinar: Join Danielle with Four Sigmatic for a live webinar on how you can support your immune system by managing your stress response.

Resources for Kids Staying at Home

• Mathschase: Maths Chase is a completely free home online learning tool where children can play times tables games, along with many other mathematics skill-based games!  The site features many simple learning games which children can play at home.
• Science with Mark Rober: Join former NASA engineer Mark Rober on YouTube Monday/Wednesday/Friday at 1pm for live science lessons. Live lessons will be posted on his channel afterwards to view at any time!
• Scholastic Learn at Home: Day by day projects to keep your kids engaged and learning. Projects based on grade level.
• Mrs. Brown's Art Lessons: Hundreds of art lessons to keep your kids creativity engaged!
• Check in with your local public library. They might have online books and resources available for you to access while at home.

Mental Health Resources While Staying at Home

• Calm: Free at home guided meditations, music, and sounds brought to you by the Calm App.
• 5 Tips To Protect Your Mental Health During Coronavirus Outbreak: UC San Diego Health Video
• Therapy Connection: Reduced cost online therapy sessions
• Journal Your Feelings: Started March 22 - April 20 Join Amber Rae in a daily writing prompt to help you navigate your feelings during this time.
• Online AA/NA Meetings: Online, Zoom, or Phone meetings for AA, NA, and Al-Anon

Physical Health Resources While Staying at Home

• Orangetheory Fitness At Home: Daily ~30 minute at home workouts via YouTube video. No special equipment required.
• Core Power Yoga On Demand: Free access to an online library of yoga and meditation classes
• Les Mills On Demand Classes: "There is something for everyone from high intensity interval training designed to improve strength and fitness fast, dance fitness workouts, the martial arts inspired BODYCOMBAT Invincible program through to mindfulness practices to slow the stream of thoughts that can cause our stress."
• Gold's Gym On Demand: A variety of workouts designed exclusively for keeping your routine when you don't have access to a gym and need to stay active!

Small Business Resources For COVID-19

• The Small Business Owner's Guide to the CARES Act: The programs and initiatives in the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act that was just passed by Congress are intended to assist business owners with whatever needs they have right now. When implemented, there will be many new resources available for small businesses, as well as certain nonprofits and other employers. 
• Disaster Loan Assistance: Federal Disaster Loans for Businesses, Private Nonprofits, Homeowners, and Renters
• What you need to know about the Families First Coronavirus Response Act: If you have fewer than 500 employees, you'll have access to three new provisions to help your business and your employees during this time. The law goes into effect on April 1, 2020 and expires on December 31, 2020. If you have fewer than 50 employees, you may be able to get a waiver exempting your business from these new requirements.
• Coronavirus Relief and Assistance Programs
• Managing Workplace Safety During Pandemic: Learn about how to stay compliant with health and safety codes and provide the best environment for your employees. Some tips and best practices.

Los Angeles

• Schedule a COVID-19 Test: Eligible if 65 or older, have underlying chronic health condition, were under mandatory 14 day quarantine for confirmed COVID-19 exposure.
• City of Los Angeles Emergency Medical Corps: "The City of Los Angeles has a need for medical professionals to support a surge in medical cases across Los Angeles due to the COVID-19 pandemic. If you are a medical professional and would like to offer support (pro bono or paid) in response to COVID-19, please complete the form. If you are selected for consideration, verification of your training may be required."
• Los Angeles City Small Business Emergency Microloan Program: The newly established Small Business Emergency Microloan Program now provides financing needed to strengthen small business enterprises in this time of acute need that have been affected by the COVID-19 outbreak.

If you have come across any helpful resources, feel free to comment below. We will check them out and possibly add them to our list!

*As this is a current news issue that changes on the daily, this article may include information that is outdated or updated. We will do our best to update this article to reflect the current state of affairs. But make sure to keep in mind our publish date so you can compare this article to current news updates*

More people staying home means more trash at apartment complexes. 

The CDC's current safety guidelines encourages the public to self distance and avoid public gatherings.

Additionally, local governments are mandating various levels of quarantines. For example in the City of Los Angeles (where our business Kleen Opener is located) bars, restaurants, entertainment venues, and gyms are being closed to the public and these end dates keep extending. Many universities and school districts across the nation are closed and moved to online classes.

As time goes on one can expect more of these types of closures to happen all across the United States. Closures are important to promote self distancing in an attempt to reduce the spread and severity of the Novel Coronavirus, COVID-19.

This means that more people will be staying home in the weeks to come.

More People Staying at Home = More Trash

Apartment complexes and multi family properties will most likely experience an increased amount of waste as people are self distancing for COVID-19.

An increased amount of waste means that garbage bins and dumpsters may be overflowing. Garbage overflow is a public health concern as it spreads germs and bacteria.

Apartment owners and property management companies should take precautions for the public health of tenants and residents.

A proactive approach to an increased amount of trash in critical during this pandemic.

Precautions For Increased Waste in Apartment Complexes

1. Order additional bins from your local waste hauler

2. Ask if you can set up more frequent pick ups temporarily

3. Make sure that your dumpsters are accessible

4. Inform your community and ask your tenants to be vigilant about properly and safely disposing of waste

Get Prepared with Kleen Opener

Kleen Opener is a dumpster lid opener that attaches to your metal or plastic dumpster. With a simple pull of a strap, Kleen Opener lifts and holds open big bulky dumpster lids. Closing lids and keeping them closed is just as easy with Kleen Opener!

Prevent garbage overflow by making all of your dumpsters easy to use and taking out the trash more convenient. Enhance your living environment and promote the health and well being of your residents and tenants with Kleen Opener.

Still have questions? Contact Us!

Reduce Reuse Recycle 

One mantra among many aimed at protecting our environment from the ever-increasing amount of trash. People around the world are becoming more aware about the environmental impact of trash and other generated waste. It is a rather large and multifaceted topic to address.

Most of the advice out there about reducing individual waste, sometimes referred to as zero-waste, focuses on people creating less non-organic waste by buying and using less single use goods and packaging.

But what if there was another way to help – a way to reduce waste and help the environment that actually has nothing to do with how much waste you create…

The Life Cycle of Waste

First, in order to talk about waste, one must be familiar with the life cycle of trash and waste. The life cycle of waste can be described as the cycle in waste is created: from raw materials to production and so on.

The above graphic is meant to provide one example of the life cycle of waste. This cycle is a simplified version that does not consider every detail about where waste comes from and goes, as it is a very multifaceted topic. Additionally, this version of the cycle is centered on the consumer or individual, but it must be noted that most waste is actually generated from over production and corporations. But there are still actions you can take as an individual to improve this cycle.

Another Way to Reduce Waste!

The general advice out there is to reduce the amount of non-organic waste you produce by limiting buying and consumption or switching to more sustainable products. While this is one way for an individual to make a positive impact on the life cycle of waste, it is not the only way. There is another way to reduce waste and protect our environment that goes beyond an individual reducing use or consumption!

Have you ever walked down a street on trash pickup day, walked around a parking lot at a shopping center, or through a busy park? If so, then it is very likely that you have seen an abundance of trash in your life. From little bins at the park, residential roller bins, to commercial sized dumpsters, there are a lot of receptacles and bins we use to collect waste. And a lot of the time this is not the only place where you see the trash; the trash is overflowing onto the ground or simply placed around or near the proper receptacles.

So another area where you as an individual can make an impact on the life cycle of waste has to do with how your trash actually gets thrown away – stopping the problem of overflowing garbage bins. Overflowing garbage bins is just one problem that arises along the life cycle of waste with some easy solutions. 

Why are overflowing garbage bins bad for the environment?

There are many negative environmental and health affects of overflowing garbage bins.

Overflowing garbage on the streets becomes home to bacteria and diseases that can be spread by the insects, rodents, and animals that it attracts.

Overflowing waste can also impact air quality which cause various respiratory issues for people from the odors and potential toxins released. Additionally, the decay of organic waste lets off methane which contributes to the greenhouse effect. Therefore it is also important to compost organic waste instead of throwing it away in the first place.

Overflowing waste also gets into our water system contaminating surface waters and threatening all ecosystems. When garbage is left on the ground outside of bins it can be carried away by rain or other elements and end up in our water systems and oceans. We are already experiencing the negative affects of this as we see our ocean suffocating from plastic and other trash that ends up there. It is important to note that most water pollution does not come from overflowing garbage bins but from businesses, corporations, and production. But it is still important to make an impact where you can as an individual.

Additionally, most people would say that overflowing garbage diminishes the quality of life in living environments as neighborhoods are seen as gross or dirty. It can improve your quality of life to live in an environment that is clean and where trash is not building up on the streets.

These are just some of the common impacts that overflowing garbage bins and dumpsters have on our environment.

How garbage overflow happens and some practical solutions:

One reason that garbage bin overflow happens is that there are not enough receptacles and bins to handle the flow of waste for that area. This could be seen at a park, restaurant, sporting field, or apartment complex for example. If there is constantly trash being left outside of the bins or falling out of them due to over filling then there are not enough bins or the bins are not being emptied often enough. This can be solved by ordering more trash cans or dumpsters either online or directly from your waste hauler and by scheduling your staff or waste hauler to pick up the trash more often.

Another reason is convenience. Unfortunately, if you want people to do the right thing then you have to make it easy and convenient for them. This means that trash receptacles must be in convenient locations and in enough locations. And not everyone wants to actively think about what they are throwing away. If you want the trash properly sorted then it is helpful to have easy to follow labels directing people on what to sort between landfill, recycle, and compost. Without labels even more people will take the convenient option of throwing everything into the trash because it is what is most familiar and convenient.

For dumpsters, the inconvenience lies in its use. Dumpsters can be very tall and have heavy lids. If people can not reach the lid to open it or are not able to lift the lid while holding trash, most often their items will get left next to the dumpster in hopes that someone else will deal with it. Luckily Kleen Opener aims to make dumpster use safer, more convenient, and effortless by allowing users to easily open and close dumpster lids. You can get Kleen Opener here or check out our Dumpster Safety 101 blog for more tips on how to make dumpster use more convenient.

It can definitely be overwhelming to think about all of the ways that our Earth is impacted by the actions we take. Just know that most of the direct impact on our environment is not an individual responsibility but something more complex that involves greater policy change. And while this may be true, it is still important to make personal shifts to help if you can. Hopefully now you are more aware about one tiny piece of the puzzle – the problem of overflowing bins – and can be more conscious of ways that you can be more intentional about how you throw away the waste that you do produce. Adding this knowledge to the other things you may do personally to help the environment will make an even greater impact.