“The Johnstonian News” reported on the discussions in the last Town Council Meeting about the recycling program and enforcement of the policies. Abandoning the program was not exactly part of the discussion but that doesn’t seem to matter for the purposes of the article.
For the record, I have already done a YouTube video on this topic and you can find it on my Facebook page, my YouTube channel, and on my vote4troy.com website.
Since this article is subscription only content, I finally broke down and decided to subscribe online. Here is the article’s content.
“SELMA — The town has a recycling program.
Basically, folks aren’t using their recycling containers for that purpose, Town Manager Brent Taylor told the Town Council last week.
If the container lid is open, the crew on the truck can catch trash before it taints the recyclable items, Taylor said.
But “if the container’s lid is closed, then they dump it … and it ruins the whole truck, so there’s not the benefit of recycling,” he said.
Recycling companies these days will reject an entire truck of materials even if the load has just one tainted item, say a greasy pizza box.
Or a plastic bag.
“Plastic bags seem to be one of the greatest violators,” Mayor Cheryl Oliver said.
Taylor said he and his staff were debating how best to encourage Selma households to use their recycling containers for recycling only. One option is to fine repeat violators, he said. Another is to take their recycling containers away.
Oliver said she feared the town might have to abandon recycling. “We don’t know where this may ultimately lead,” she said. “We keep hearing about the contaminated loads of recycling, so what good is the recycling program?
“We’re sincerely taking a hard look at whether we continue recycling.”
Oliver encouraged folks to read the town’s most recent newsletter, which lists all of the things eligible for recycling. “Keep that,” she said. “Check it if you’re in doubt. Or if you’re in doubt, just don’t put it in there.”
Taylor said the town was reinforcing what’s in the newsletter. “As early as last week, we did start putting notifications out on what contaminates a recycling bin.,” he said. “We can try that for a couple of weeks and see, and then next month, we could come back with a recommendation to you.”
VOTE4TROY 