Big Brother is Watching Your Garbage

The following article appeared the Journal News on April 26, 2009.

N. Castle cracks down on recycle scofflaws

By Elizabeth Ganga

NORTH CASTLE - Some homeowners pulled into their driveways last week and were confronted with an unusual sight: garbage left where they had put it out in the morning.

Brightly colored stickers saying "Oops!" gave them a clue what they did wrong. They had failed to separate garbage and recyclables, triggering the "refusal to collect" penalty in the town and county recycling law.

After months of warning letters and tracking of violators, last week the town and its garbage contractors, Suburban Carting, began leaving cans and bags of mixed garbage and recyclables where they found them. It is one of the escalating steps in an enforcement crackdown aimed at keeping recyclables out of the landfill and the incinerator.

"If you leave somebody's household garbage, they're not going to be happy, and they have to learn you don't mix your recycling and your garbage," said Councilwoman Rebecca Kittredge, as she followed the Suburban truck on Wednesday around the streets south of Byram Lake. Kittredge jotted down who got a sticker so they could be sent warning letters explaining the recycling law.

Kittredge and Suburban's recycling coordinator, Diane Chickering, have been tracking the households that consistently mix recycling with the garbage and, if they don't fall into line, the next step is fines starting at $100.

While other towns have used the oops stickers and sometimes leave garbage, North Castle's effort to bring residents in line is the most comprehensive that county officials are aware of, said Louis Vetrone, the deputy commissioner for solid waste for Westchester's Department of Environmental Facilities.

North Castle's crackdown is an outgrowth of a county enforcement effort that started early last year with the distribution of 120,000 oops stickers and seminars to train haulers, large businesses and towns in the 1992 law. The county also began issuing warnings and tickets to large violators, most often businesses, and sometimes waste haulers. About 200 notices of violation were issued last year and 125 so far this year, Vetrone said. The amount of recyclables has increased 17 percent since the enforcement began, he said.

"Virtually all the municipalities have bought into this," Vetrone said.

The effort also dovetailed with the town's attempts to raise its recycling rate, including forming a recycling committee and increasing the number of recycling containers downtown. Suburban, faced with the potential for fines, approached the town about leaving garbage on the curb, and the town decided a graduated education effort was needed.

Evelyn Bauer of Byram Lake Road was one resident who got a sticker last week for a piece or two of paper in her bag of cans and bottles. Since the beginning of the year, the town has been picking up cans and bottles and paper and cardboard on alternating weeks to save money.

Bauer said she doesn't mind pulling out recyclables but did prefer once a week pickup of everything, finding holding onto cans and bottles for two weeks less sanitary. Now, after hauling her cans back up to her house, she will have four weeks worth for the next collection day.

"I guess it teaches us a lesson," said Bauer, a volunteer at the Byram Hills High School College and Career Center

Yes Ms. Bauer, it certainly does teach us a lesson, about our town board. They cut recycling pick ups to every other week. Then they can't understand why residents don't want their garages to look like refuse transfer stations. So having no other creative ideas, Supervisor Berman orders a crack down on frustrated residents. Its reasons like this that have Berman's approval rating in the ditch, along the road repairs not taking place.