Last year’s drastic reduction in Chattanooga’s recycling services (for those from out of town: our curbside pickup went from once a week to once a month) has been a disaster for a community that likes to call itself “the environmental city.” Every month when I drag all my bags out to the curb (bags of refuse that I’ve had to live with all month long), mine are the lone bags in my vicinity — I’ve never seen any other recycling out there on the curb.
Recycling isn’t increasing in the Scenic City. In fact, people have understandably confessed that the city has made it too hard, and they’re ready to heave all of their refuse into the trash — and who knows how many have already given in to the allure of the landfill? Pitch it all in those ginormous trash cans the city has distributed throughout our neighborhoods, and it will disappear forever! Like magic! No separating! No driving! No storing it for the rest of the month!
Further, this new monthly recycling program hasn’t saved the city any money, since more money was put into increasing the number of dropoff centers in the city. And, vacuously enough, $100,000 in taxpayer funds was spent on a (hamfisted) PR campaign, complete with a ridiculous recycling raccoon, meant to convince Chattanoogans that these changes are all a good thing.
Well, they’re not a good thing. When you look around at what progressive communities are doing around the country, Chattanooga’s efforts clearly are a step backwards, despite silly claims to the contrary:
He said over about a year’s time, those using the recycling dropoff center on Access Road went from 795 to 2,058 in a month and at the Patten Center in Lookout Valley went from 370 to over 2,000 per month.
Oy. Well, of course the use of dropoff centers has gone up! Because we no longer have curbside pickup! And by requiring each individual who has recyclables to drive to a dropoff center, you’re trading the environmental benefit of recycling with the increased pollution caused by so many individual vehicles putting extra miles on our roads.
And in the meantime, davidm, who did a series of posts about recycling that introduced me to Norcal (and which, sadly, have since been lost to server issues), contacted Josh when he did his research. Josh, who used to live in Chattanooga, now lives in the San Francisco area and gave david the following report:
“Here, they’ve removed every obstacle to recycling. Recycling day is always the same as garbage day so it’s easy to remember. Since you’re putting everything out at once, you’re more likely to recycle everything you can. No sorting. No special-colored bags.
Unfortunately, our mayor has taken the opposite approach, by making recycling efforts as frustrating as possible. And the mayor’s office is so enamored with that absurd raccoon (has anyone spotted that thing lately? Word has it the creature’s last appearance was on the mayor’s Christmas Card), that he’s going to throw away another $100,000 after wasting the same amount last year. It’s a great deal for Waterhouse Public Relations, but what does the taxpayer have to show for all that money, besides a rarely-spotted oversized raccoon? And why, if this money was supposedly spent last year to conceive of and develop this PR campaign, is the same amount necessary for this year, to merely continue on with more of the same?
I think perhaps we’re not getting our money’s worth.
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