Recycling Services Grow; Fees Won’t

The Board of Public Works on Friday approved trash recycling services for all 541,000 residential units in large apartment complexes and condominiums in Los Angeles, but officials said the expanded services wouldn’t cost taxpayers anything.

Until now, except for a test program, recycling services have been limited to those living in the city’s 750,000 single-family dwellings and in multifamily complexes with fewer than five units.

“This program will extend recycling services to all Angelenos,” said Cynthia Ruiz, president of the Board of Public Works. “This will be a huge step toward protecting the environment, preserving valuable natural resources and achieving our goal of diverting 70% of our refuse from landfills by 2020.”

Rita Robinson, director of the city’s Bureau of Sanitation, said the current diversion figure is about 60%. The refuse comes from dwellings, businesses and governmental institutions.

The expanded plan must be approved by the mayor and City Council. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa has indicated he wants all of the city’s about 4 million residents to be served by a trash recycling program by July 2008.

Karen Coca, an environmental affairs officer with the Department of Public Works, said officials hoped to have the expanded services operating throughout the city by summer 2007.

Historically, trash collection for the city’s single-family homes and small multifamily units has been handled by Bureau of Sanitation employees. Trash collection for large condominiums and apartment complexes has been contracted out to private haulers.

Under the new plan, residents of large multifamily complexes would separate recyclables -- such as paper and glass -- from the rest of their trash and place them in separate containers. The private haulers, operating under the supervision of the Bureau of Sanitation, would collect recyclable trash and nonrecyclable trash separately.

Ruiz said the annual $6-million to $10-million cost of expanding the services would be paid by permit fees from the private haulers, who make money from materials sold to recycling companies.

“It will not involve the expenditure of any taxpayer funds,” Ruiz said.

She said the board’s unanimous decision to expand recycling came after a “highly successful” pilot program, started last spring, that provided recycling services for 61,000 units at large multifamily complexes.