City Could Toss Recycling Efforts

Cutting program would help fund other projects, mayor says.

The Dallas City Council is ready to can its recycling program for at least a year to conserve hours at recreation centers, pools and libraries.

 

Mayor Laura Miller has pushed to make recycling a service that residents would get for paying $3 to $6 a month, according to some council estimates discussed at Monday's budget workshop. Ending the city's contract with a recycling firm and shifting the costs to users would save about $1 million. That would help officials restore cuts in the park and library departments, and increase the money available for street repairs.

 

The city faces a $95 million shortfall in next year's $1.7 billion budget. The proposed budget, which the council will amend until it approves a final version on Sept. 25, relies heavily on layoffs and service cuts to make up the shortfall.

 

Ms. Miller and several council members have said recycling has not worked as well as officials hoped when it began two years ago.

 

"The majority of us are comfortable taking a $2 million program that is not efficient and doing something else with it," Ms. Miller said.

 

Some of the council's strongest advocates of environmental causes agreed to support the mayor's plan. The program reached 50,000 households this year, city officials said.

 

"I am disappointed that we are going to eliminate a recycling program that, while it has problems, has shown some success," said council member Lois Finkelman, who pushed the program two years ago but said it was never adequately funded.

 

The five-year contract with Community Waste Disposal of Dallas cost the city $16.7 million. The contract allows the city to end the program if the council does not allocate the money to support it, officials said.

 

Company representatives sat quietly during the council's three-hour discussion Monday. After the meeting, the company's president told reporters that his firm was improving the city's recycling record.

 

Greg Roemer said the company collects 750 tons of recyclable material each month, up from 497 in October 2000.

 

"I want those [council] people around the horseshoe to say it's a smashing success and they're still getting rid of it," Mr. Roemer said.

 

City officials offered contrasting evidence – only 4 percent of the city's refuse gets recycled. State officials have told cities that residents ought to recycle 40 percent.

 

Council members agreed to create a task force, which would include Sierra Club members, that would study ways to improve recycling. Citywide recycling could return in 2004, council members said.

 

The council and the Sierra Club agree that Dallas has never provided motivation to recycle. The city's twice-weekly garbage service encourages homeowners to throw more away, they said.

 

Recycling service has never reached apartment complexes, where 60 percent of the city's residents live. – Dallas Morning News