This agreement provides funding from the infrastructure investment and jobs act (IIJA)

Environmental Protection Agency Region 5 awarded the City of Cincinnati a $4,999,557 cooperative agreement on April 1, 2026, under the Solid Waste Infrastructure for Recycling (SWIFR) Grants program (CFDA 66.920) to deploy 80,000 new recycling carts and conduct community outreach designed to increase recycling participation and support the city's goal of achieving a 90 percent waste diversion rate by 2050.

The city will replace broken carts out of warranty and expand curbside recycling service to new households in targeted communities, accompanied by an education campaign reinforcing recycling best practices and providing targeted messaging to neighborhoods with lower recycling participation rates. The city will establish, increase, expand, and optimize collection and materials management infrastructure and capacity, and demonstrate measurable increases in diversion rate, recycling rate, and quality of materials collected for municipal solid waste.

The agreement obligates $4,999,557 with a period of performance from April 1, 2026, through March 31, 2029. Work is performed in Cincinnati, Ohio. No sub-recipients are included in this assistance agreement. The SWIFR program supports improvements to post-consumer materials management systems, including municipal recycling collection, transport, recovery, reuse, and recycling infrastructure operated by states, territories, tribes, and their political subdivisions.

EPA's solid waste infrastructure for recycling (swifr) grants for political subdivisions of states and territories will fund activities that will result in a significant decrease in the generation of municipal solid waste (MSW) and/or an increase in the diversion of MSW from landfills and incineration, as well as fund innovative solutions and programs that provide or increase access to prevention, reuse, mechanical recycling, anaerobic digestion, and composting. The purpose of this award is to enhance the city of cincinnati's efforts to meet the swifr grants elements. Specifically, the city of cincinnati will deploy 80,000 new recycling carts, replacing broken carts out of warranty and expanding service to new households in targeted communities. This investment will allow the city to continue to serve the community, extending ohio's oldest curbside recycling program for another ten years. Cart distribution will be accompanied by a community outreach and education campaign, designed to increase recycling participation, reinforce recycling best practices, and provide targeted messaging to communities with lower recycling participation rates. By modernizing the city's recycling infrastructure and motivating residents to participate, the city can make substantial progress toward its goal of achieving a 90% waste diversion rate by 2050.activities:the activities to be performed are 1) establish, increase, expand, or optimize collection and improve materials management infrastructure; 2) establish, increase, expand, or optimize capacity for materials management; 3) demonstrate a significant and measurable increase in the diversion, recycling rate, and quality of materials collected for municipal solid wastesubrecipient:no subawards are included in this assistance agreement.outcomes:the anticipated deliverables include; - daily grant management and routine meetings with U.S.EPA and submission of timely reports (quarterly and final) - 80,000 recycling carts - monthly vendor reports tracking household participation - 16,000 tons of recyclables projected/tracked, with material-by-type reporting (e.g., cardboard, paper, metals, plastics, glass) . - jobs retained (31) and temporary deployment jobs created (6-12) documented as part of grant administration . The expected outcomes include adding 80,000 recycling carts to the fleet city-wide, replacing carts beyond their 10-year warranty to restore functionality and reliability to the city's recycling program, providing recycling carts through a city-wide OPT-in initiative to up to 5,000 new households that previously lacked them, targeting communities with lower recycling participation rates, conducting a comprehensive city-wide outreach and education campaign to address recycling best practices, encourage participation, and reduce contamination, and achieving a measurable increase in recycling participation and diversion rates city-wide, particularly in neighborhoods with lower recycling participation. The intended beneficiaries include the city of cincinnati.