30 Years Later, Yorty Switches Stand on Trash

Sam Yorty once courted Los Angeles voters by promising that, if he were elected mayor, they could put all their trash in a single container and would no longer have to separate cans, bottles and paper for pickup.

But that was nearly 30 years ago, and the world--and the city’s problem of trash disposal--has changed.

And, so has the 80-year-old Yorty, who defeated Mayor Norris Poulson in 1961, partly on the issue of trash collection.

At the time, Yorty described trash separation as “coercion against the house wives of this city.”

After the City Council approved a mandatory trash recycling plan Wednesday, the crusty ex-mayor said in a telephone interview that he favors giving the program a try, even though he thinks it is “going to be a nuisance.”

The recycling plan would require nearly 750,000 single-family households in Los Angeles to separate glass and plastic bottles, aluminum cans and newspapers into different containers for collection.

“They can try it,” Yorty said. “I don’t know how it’s going to work out. I’m for it if they can make it work.”

Yorty said the 1961 situation was different.

“They had to save all the cans in a separate container, and a private contractor was supposed to pick them up once a month. If the cans weren’t picked up one month, it would be two months.

“Imagine saving cans for a month? It was ridiculous.”