Haulers May Have to Offer Recycling

Los Angeles’ private trash haulers would be required to provide recycling services to the apartments and businesses they serve under a proposal to significantly expand the amount of waste diverted from landfills.

The plan, now under review by Mayor Richard Riordan, would require more than 100 private trash haulers to enter into franchise agreements with the city to provide recycling to their customers.

“We are recommending that recycling be a condition for receiving a franchise,” said Judith Wilson, director of the city Sanitation Bureau. “Every customer would be offered an opportunity to recycle.”

The change could help the city meet Riordan’s goal of recycling 70% of all trash generated in Los Angeles by 2020, up from 47% today, officials said Tuesday.

Riordan asked the bureau to draft a franchise ordinance in December, when he approved expansion of Sunshine Canyon Landfill into Granada Hills. Opponents of the dump argued the expansion would not be necessary if the city recycled more of the 3.4 million tons of trash it generates annually.

“We are still evaluating it,” Riordan spokeswoman Carolina Guevara said of the proposal. “But we are working with the staff to implement this type of recycling program throughout the city.”

Currently, the city collects about 34% of the city’s trash, mostly from single-family homes and some apartment buildings, with 54% picked up by private haulers who serve the remaining apartment buildings and commercial clients, according to Drew Sones, who oversees trash collection for the city. The remainder is considered self-haul, the trash that property owners and businesses take to the dump themselves.

While the city offers its customers full-service recycling, few private haulers provide widespread recycling, partly because there is no requirement to do so, said Lupe Vela, who heads the Citywide Recycling Division.

The city could mandate that all apartment buildings and businesses recycle. But city officials said a study of other cities found that a franchise system requiring haulers to offer the service works better.

“Based on the research the bureau has done, the most effective and successful recycling efforts have occurred in cities that require the franchisees to provide recycling services to multifamily and other customers,” said Ellen Stein, president of the Public Works Board.

Haulers said Tuesday that a recycling mandate would drive up the cost of service, which they would have to pass on to customers.

“We want to remain as competitive as possible,” said Laree Johnson, who manages a hauling company in the San Fernando Valley.

Arnie Berghoff, who represents Browning-Ferris Industries and Republic Services, also cited the cost. “We will comply with whatever they ask, but someone has to pay for it,” Berghoff said. “Essentially the customers will end up paying for it.”

Sones said a survey of other cities found that recycling could add about $1 to $2.50 per apartment household to the average monthly refuse collection bill. The plan would not increase costs to those now receiving city trash service.

“We don’t want to put the small haulers out of business,” said Janet Oliphant of the Greater Los Angeles Solid Waste Management Assn. “There are a number of questions we have.”

Sones said the change would be a major shift in city policy.

“This city has historically been an open market for private haulers,” he said. “For the city of Los Angeles, this is a major step.”

Even if the proposal is adopted, it could take a number of years to implement the commercial recycling program.

“It took us 10 years to roll the first one out,” Sones said.