City Hopes New Recycling Program Will Boost Participation, Revenues

The days when recycling meant getting up to your elbows in trash to separate aluminum cans from bottles and newspapers will soon be over.

Under a citywide program to be launched today, Los Angeles residents will dump all recyclable material into large blue barrels that will be picked up by automated city trucks.

The barrels will replace small yellow bins that the city provided under its curbside recycling program. Those bins would take only cans and bottles; newspapers and cardboard had to be set on the curb separately.

During a six-month pilot program in the west San Fernando Valley, the blue barrels collected 148% more recycled material, increasing from 6.5 pounds per household per week to 16 pounds.

In addition, the number of residents who participated in the curbside recycling effort increased 84%, sanitation officials said.

The pilot program was launched at 12,000 homes in the west Valley in April. By the time it ended, residents had given the program a 92% satisfaction rating, according to a city survey.

The city initially will spend $32 million to buy the barrels for 720,000 homes citywide. City officials expect the program ultimately will save the city about $3 million a year.

The savings will come from paying less to dump trash at private landfills and from collecting more revenue from the sale of recycled material. In addition, the city expects to reduce the number of sanitation workers by collecting the material with automated trucks. The yellow bins are unloaded by hand.

The recycled material from the barrels will be separated at city-contracted recycling centers. The city is paid slightly less per ton for unseparated material, but sanitation officials believe that the overall increase in recycling citywide will more than make up for the difference.

“These new blues will help Angelenos maximize the green by saving millions of taxpayer dollars and protecting the environment,” said Mayor Richard Riordan, who plans to join Councilwomen Laura Chick and Ruth Galanter today to announce the new program.

The new barrels will be distributed throughout the city over the next 18 months, starting in the west Valley and north-central Los Angeles, said Drew Sones, who oversees the city’s recycling division.

The barrels will hold 90 gallons and will be taller than the black 60-gallon trash barrels that all residents now have, he said. The black barrels will still be used for other household trash.

Sones believes scavengers who steal newspapers and aluminum cans from the yellow bins will be discouraged by the barrels’ lids and the commingled materials.

Chick, who represents the west Valley, said she believes that the new program will be well-received.

“We keep trying to find a more convenient way to encourage people to recycle,” she said. “This is a very thoughtless process. You just take all your recyclables and toss them in the can.”