Rancho P.V. to Start Curb-Side Recycling Program on July 1

Recycling is getting easier.

Starting July 1, residents of 6,100 homes in Rancho Palos Verdes--about half of the city’s single-family residences--will be able to recycle discarded aluminum cans, newspapers and bottles when their trash is picked up.

The rest of the city, excluding multiple-unit dwellings, will have recycling by the end of the year.

The program is voluntary and residents will not get any money for recycling.

Redondo Beach, which had recycling for more than four years but abandoned it a year and a half ago, is looking to revive it next year. Manhattan Beach is analyzing the cost of starting a program, and Rolling Hills Estates is also looking into the idea.

$5,000 for Feasibility Study

For the County Sanitation Districts, it’s good news every time a city adds its name to the recycling roster. The agency, which handles a major portion of trash disposal in the county at four dump sites, is encouraging cities to recycle by offering $5,000 for a feasibility study.

“The days of recycling as a hobby or a fun thing to do are over,” said Bill George, recycling coordinator for the Sanitation Districts. “We have to look at it as a legitimate method of solid waste management.”

While Rancho Palos Verdes will receive money from the sale of recycled material that its trash hauler sells, the city is pushing the program to reduce the amount of trash that has to be dumped.

City spokeswoman Cari Cooper said the City Council made recycling one component of a five-year franchise awarded to its hauler, Waste Management of California, in response to the sanitation districts’ warnings of a trash glut in the 1990s if the amount of disposable waste is not reduced and new dump sites are not developed.

John Kilgore, an engineer with the districts’ solid waste management division, said that by 1991 there will be “some tonnage out there that will not have a facility to be taken to” unless landfills open.

Crisis Can Be Delayed

“Recycling will not solve the problem,” he said, “but it will reduce the problem to the extent that this crisis scenario in 1991 can be delayed two to three years.”

George said that one-third of the 45,000 tons of trash thrown away daily in the county, one-third is from residences. He said 20% of this residential waste--newspapers, bottles, plastic and cans--can be recycled.

According to the recycling division of the California Department of Conservation, curb-side recycling, though not new, is becoming a trend. “Essentially, cities are coming to terms with not being able to (find sites for) landfills,” said division spokeswoman Kate McGuire.

There are 46 cities or counties in the state that have curb-side programs conducted by their own sanitation districts or private haulers under city franchises or contracts, according to the conservation department.

They include Burbank, Claremont, Downey, Glendale, Los Angeles--which has two limited pilot programs--and Santa Monica. Duarte recently started one, according to George, and Walnut will begin recycling Sept. 1.

The Rancho Palos Verdes program encompasses homes in Eastview, Miraleste and all areas south of Crest Road except Portuguese Bend. Waste Management is supplying all residents with three recycling bins--for aluminum cans, glass and newspapers, respectively--which will be picked up weekly on one of two regular trash collection days.

High Public Awareness

Other carriers serve the rest of the city, and negotiations are under way to have them include recycling in their trash collection.

Although recycling experts say that public awareness of the trash crisis and the need to recycle is high, curb-side recycling programs pose problems that can discourage cities from undertaking them.

The programs have to be subsidized by the cities or trash customers because prices paid for materials do not cover collection and hauling costs; haulers need special equipment to collect and transport separated materials, which are passed on to customers in rates, and illegal scavenging results not only in lost material--and income--but complaints from residents about strangers going through their trash.

George Osepian, vice president of Western Waste Industries, which collects trash in Redondo Beach, said that city’s curb-side recycling program failed because there was only 15% participation. “There’s no way you can make it on that amount,” Osepian said, adding that the Redondo Beach recycling program lost $100,000 a year.

He said the climate is better now for a program in Redondo Beach “because more and more people understand recycling and will be willing to participate.”

Some Los Angeles-area cities that recycle say they are finding success where it counts most--the reduction of trash that has to be dumped.

Santa Monica is recycling about 2,000 tons of material a year, about 2.5% of the city’s residential and commercial waste, according to Deborah Baine, Santa Monica recycling coordinator. She said this reduction is good because 85% of the residents are apartment dwellers who do not have curb-side service but take their trash to alley drop-off sites. To boost participation, the city has 45 neighborhood coordinators who encourage their neighbors to take part.

Expanded in September

Los Angeles has two pilot curb-side recycling programs available to 15,000 Westside residents and 1,500 in the San Fernando Valley, the latter to be expanded to 10,000 by September, according to the city Bureau of Sanitation. It is planning one for 30,000 homes in South-Central Los Angeles in February.

Spokeswoman Anna Sklar said the bureau has achieved a goal of recycling 9% of the trash in the two programs, and half of the households participate, she said. The Los Angeles City Council has asked the bureau to develop a mandatory plan for the entire city, she said.

Baine said scavenging is a significant problem in Santa Monica that has cut into revenue from recycling and has given some people a negative view of the idea.

“Citizens are willing to participate in a program for the general benefit of the city, but they are not willing to do it for the profit of private individuals,” she said, adding that the city gets many complaints.

The fluctuating values of recycled materials also affects curb-side programs, because when the market is good, people tend to sell their own materials rather than put them on the curb.

Recycling, particularly by individuals, received a boost in 1986 with passage of the so-called bottle bill, which established recycling centers that accept metal, glass and plastic beverage containers within half a mile of all supermarkets and offer a minimum payment of one-cent per beverage container.

Paper Market Surged

Redondo Recycle, which is operated by Western Waste, currently pays 71 cents for a foot-high bundle of newspapers, 60 cents a pound for aluminum (it will be 65 cents after July 1); and 4.8 cents a pound for glass bottles, according to the company.

Manager Craig Osepian said the paper market has surged in the last eight months because of exports to Asian countries that lack trees for making paper. Since 1986, he said, the value of glass has doubled, and aluminum cans have gone up 150% in price, thanks in part to the bottle bill.

Like Santa Monica, which includes a recycling charge in its monthly trash collection fees, Rancho Palos Verdes will pass costs on to the customer. The $14.40 monthly trash charge will include a $1.38 fee for recycling whether the resident does it or not.

Manhattan Beach City Manager David Thompson said the curb-side recycling plan that his city is studying would be similar, with a probable monthly charge of 75 cents.

The recycling charge has prompted some complaints to Rancho Palos Verdes and to Waste Management’s Gardena office.

“A handful object to the fee, but we’ve received many phone calls, 90% of them positive,” said Craig Young, sales manager for Waste Management.

Hopes for 20% Participation

In order to make recycling work financially in Rancho Palos Verdes, Waste Management and the city are counting on a healthy level of participation--the city is hoping for 20%--and a reduction in hauling and dumping charges as the amount of trash that must be dumped declines.

Young said his company already has put $100,000 into the program for the bins and a special vehicle that will be used to pick them up.

He said that although materials markets fluctuate daily, his company should be able to get up to $40 a ton for newspapers, $85 a ton for glass and 90 cents a pound for aluminum.

All money goes to the city, and Cooper said most of it will be used for promotion--which recycling experts say is vital to convincing people that recycling is worth the effort of separating materials and putting them out on the curb.

“There’s a risk involved,” Young said, “but we feel the citizens are behind us.”