Recycling, composting programs cut

When New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg took office early this year, it was expected that the city's recycling program would take some hard hits. Indeed, those expectations became reality, resulting in significant cuts in the recycling and composting programs. On the curbside recycling side, all that is left is collection of paper, with glass, plastic and most metals eliminated. "Technically, the city kept the metal portion of the curbside program, but in reality, that only consists of bulk metal collection," says Thomas Outerbridge of City Green, Inc. an organics and materials recycling consulting firm in Manhattan. "The blue bag program using materials recovery facilities (MRFs) is pretty much over. The whole leaf composting program got axed, including the programs at the botanical gardens in the boroughs. The only composting components left are the food residuals composting facility at the Rikers Island correctional facility and a yard trimmings composting operation at thE closed Fresh Kills landfill on Staten Island that is servicing private landscapers. The city estimates it is saving about $30 million in costs for processing recyclables and another $10 million to $15 million in collection costs."

Outerbridge adds that Mayor Bloomberg and City Council have formed a task force that is looking at how the recycling program can be reinstated effectively. The task force's report is scheduled for completion in January 2003. "Unless they can come up with a way of reinstating the program that doesn't cost more than exporting, I doubt the program as it was will be reinstated," he adds. "Metals, glass and plastics collection costs were running about twice that of garbage collection and processing at the MRFs also was expensive. Realistically, both those need to be fixed before anything is brought back on line."

Right now, New York City's cost for exporting garbage is about $65/ton -- not including collection costs. The recycling program was diverting about 20 percent of the 12,000 tons of municipal waste generated daily. The recycling and composting programs that were cut accounted for about ten percent of that diversion, estimates Outerbridge.