Muriel Williman never thought she would make her living in garbage. But for more than a decade, that’s what she has been doing.
“Even when I was in college, I was the person that would have to leave the room for people to even throw anything away,” said Williman, the education and outreach coordinator for the Orange County Solid Waste Management Department.
“I was composting in my apartment. I was sorting recyclables before it got trendy. Environmental consciousness was ingrained in me from a very young age.”
Williman said she learned many of her conservation habits from her mother.
“When I was a kid I used to walk in the woods with my mom, and she would talk about being mindful of our impact on the environment,” she said. “That’s what I try to convey to people today.”
Williman majored in environmental studies at a state university in New York, but after graduation she couldn’t find a job in the field.
She decided to search for jobs in Raleigh near her mother.
“I would definitely give my mom a lot of credit for my personality today,” Williman said. “I learned to compost at her knee.”
After teaching about animals for local museums, Williman became the school recycling coordinator for the nonprofit organization that operated Durham’s recycling.