Recycling Refuse From Households

My cleaning lady, a longtime family friend, and I are responsible for recycling everything possible in this household and the apartment complex. On her biweekly visits, all sacked newspapers, aluminum cans, glass bottles and plastic bottles are collected. The newspapers are donated to her church and everything else she sells to Santa Ana Recycling Centers. She uses all small glass jars for canning jams, jellies and fruits and vegetables, and I am lucky enough that some come back full.

As I dump my trash, I always fill up the waste basket at the dumpster with recyclable materials. From my long experience at this large apartment complex, practically no one recycles. This is a tremendous waste and an unnecessary cost to the taxpayer on landfill dump fees. There is room at the rear on the sidewalk for one large recycling bin. Let everyone put everything recyclable into this one bin and the city can sort it out upon collection.

Make it simple to recycle at apartment complexes, such as this one, and you will have a great success. I would estimate that a third of the contents of the dumpsters were recyclable materials.

RICHARD D. MERKER

Irvine