My city lying about recycling?

[adric22]

My city doesn't have a curb-side recycle program. But several years ago they added a dumpster near city hall labeled for recycling and sent us all information explaining that we could drop off our recycling. A lot of people do this. It is actually not unusual for me to get to the dumpster to find it overflowing and have to come back later.

However.. I've had a gut feeling something is wrong because on 2 other occasions I drove into the parking lot with the dumpsters as a garbage truck was driving out. The recycle containers were empty, and so was all of the other dumpsters. The type of truck in question is just a regular garbage truck, not something that would have multiple containers inside. Which lead me to believe maybe the one truck was emptying all of them and hauling it to the landfill. But I figured maybe it was just coincidence. Maybe the recycle truck had come just shortly before.

Well, this morning I saw it happen. I pulled up and there was the trash truck emptying the recycle dumpster, then moved right over and dumped all of the trash dumpsters right on top and drove off. I snapped a photo, but didn't catch the whole thing on video.


What do you think I should do about this? Somebody needs to hear about it. I think there are going to be a lot of angry people who have been lied to and have been wasting their time collecting their recyclables for no reason. It is one thing if the city doesn't want to recycle, but to lie to us all is another thing entirely.

[DefensiveCarry.com]

[retsupt99]

There is probably someone being paid to monitor the recycle program, or some tax dollars received to have a recycle program.
No need to investigate, just quietly call your local news media and have THEM video tape the process...they would probably love to have the story.

[Guns and more]

Are you saying the government lied to you?
I'm shocked.
Forget politicians, they are all in on it.
You might find a newspaper that is interested, if they're not in the pocket of the politicians.
Welcome to America 2011.

[Inspector71]

Or, maybe the trash truck driver just thinks a dumpster is a dumpster is a dumpster.

[paaiyan]

Or, maybe the trash truck driver just thinks a dumpster is a dumpster is a dumpster.

Either way it needs to be fixed. I'd contact local media.

[gasmitty]

Or, maybe the trash truck driver just thinks a dumpster is a dumpster is a dumpster.

Most likely this is the answer.

Before you call Channel 8 news, call your city's trash/waste service division and explain what you saw and when. Give them a reasonable opportunity to remedy the situation, like maybe two weeks if you have weekly pickup. If it continues, then let the news media know.

FWIW, most of the Phoenix-area towns have separate days and trucks for recyleables and for trash, although in one town recently I saw a new truck that was divided longitudinally - port side for recycleables, starboard side for trash.

[Sig35seven]

Recycling makes everyone feel all warm and fuzzy. Like we're really doing something to help the planet.

It wastes natural resources and does more harm than good. Recycle is another nanny state program designed to create more government jobs.

Think about all those big deisel trucks driving around sucking down fuel and then the factories that consume energy and all the contaminated water that results from the process. What a scam program.

Are we really running out of sand to make glass?

They should reduced the consumtion of the products at the source. Boxes of cereal half full, stop junk mail and phone books to save paper or make the containers for products smaller. Look at the box a DVD comes in. Total waste of materials.

Be glad they don't recycle.

[SIXTO]

A lot of cities have found that people don't separate as they should, and people also throw trash into the recycling bin. That really screws up the simpler systems to count on people performing simple tasks, and makes a lot of waste from what would be good recyclable material. So, instead of relying on the masses to perform a simple task, it is more cost and time effective to simply collect all the trash as trash, and separate it at a facility.

[WHEC724]

Recycling makes everyone feel all warm and fuzzy. Like we're really doing something to help the planet.

It wastes natural resources and does more harm than good. Recycle is another nanny state program designed to create more government jobs.

Think about all those big deisel trucks driving around sucking down fuel and then the factories that consume energy and all the contaminated water that results from the process. What a scam program.

Are we really running out of sand to make glass?

They should reduced the consumtion of the products at the source. Boxes of cereal half full, stop junk mail and phone books to save paper or make the containers for products smaller. Look at the box a DVD comes in. Total waste of materials.

Be glad they don't recycle.

So politically incorrect and so true. Just like biofuels that consume more engergy to produce than they actually yield.

[bbqgrill]

Recycling makes everyone feel all warm and fuzzy. Like we're really doing something to help the planet.

It wastes natural resources and does more harm than good. Recycle is another nanny state program designed to create more government jobs.

Think about all those big deisel trucks driving around sucking down fuel and then the factories that consume energy and all the contaminated water that results from the process. What a scam program.

Are we really running out of sand to make glass?

Interesting take on the subject. I am far from being a rabid environmentalist my vehicles are two (2) Suburbans and an F150 but I do recycle because it seems to make sense. I am pushing 50 and we did newspaper recycling when I was a kid (I thought it worked), metal recycling has existed as a private industry for a very long time. As for glass, I don't know; but, plastic raw materials are growing more scarce. Not to mention landfill are not all that great either and trucking costs seems moot since the material will be collected regardless of the destination, landfill or recycling. I guess I am wondering is this your opinion or, are there facts to substantiate the claim. Seriously, not trying to be argumentative just curious, I actually pay extra to have recyclables picked up from my home and I would be happy to stop paying extra if there is no benefit.

They should reduced the consumtion of the products at the source. Boxes of cereal half full, stop junk mail and phone books to save paper or make the containers for products smaller. Look at the box a DVD comes in. Total waste of materials.

Be glad they don't recycle.

This we can totally agree on, is very true.

[SIGP250]

I drink a lot of soda, mostly coke. Gave up beer but I still like drinks with carbonation. Anyhow, I found I was taking out about 5 bags of garbage a week and most of it was cans. The bums were having a field day at my dumpster.

Finally I got smart, bought a can crusher and started saving the cans. The possums get into the bags (coke heads) but after I collect about 6 large size bags it is about 20 pounds of aluminum. I take the crushed cans to the same place where the bums were getting their wine money. It pays if your not too proud. I drive there I don't use a shopping cart as most do.

Since the neighborhood where the recycling place is not the best, I carry my 5" Stainless Kimber open. They take me to the front to the line every time.

Hay, it pays for the ammo.

[adric22]

Before you call Channel 8 news, call your city's trash/waste service division and explain what you saw and when. Give them a reasonable opportunity to remedy the situation, like maybe two weeks if you have weekly pickup. If it continues, then let the news media know..

I sent a few emails to various people at the city with the attached photograph. We'll see what they have to say about it before I start calling the news media.

As for AMSig35seven's comment about the whole concept of recycling, I'm not sure what to say. I don't really want to turn this thread into a long argument about it. But there are people who don't believe man landed on the moon, there are people who believe that a Prius produces more pollution than a hummer, people who think the earth is only 6,000 years old, people who believe smoking won't cause cancer, and then there are people who think recycling consumes more energy and resources than it saves. I lump all of those beliefs into a big group of people who believe what they want to believe because it suits their purpose.

I'll admit recycling isn't always the most economical way to go about things, depending on the material. For example, copper is worth a lot of money because it is scarce. So it is profitable to recycle. Plastic, on the other hand, is very cheap. So it may cost as much or more money to recycle it than it does to make new stuff out of oil. But that doesn't mean it is more damaging to the environment. Also many of the larger cities no longer have space for landfills, so every bit they can recycle benefits them. Some day, hundreds of years from now, when oil becomes very scarce and expensive I wouldn't be surprised to see people digging up old landfills so that they can recycle all of those TV dinner containers and water bottles that we all throw out today.

[OD*]

In the line at the store, the cashier told an older woman that she should bring her own grocery bags because plastic bags weren't good for the environment.

The woman apologized to him and explained, "We didn't have the green thing back in my day."

The clerk responded, "That's our problem today. Your generation did not care enough to save our environment."

He was right -- our generation didn't have the green thing in its day.

Back then, we returned milk bottles, soda bottles and beer bottles to the store. The store sent them back to the plant to be washed and sterilized and refilled, so it could use the same bottles over and over. So they really were recycled.


We drank from a fountain when we were thirsty instead of using a cup or a plastic bottle every time we had a drink of water.

We refilled writing pens with ink instead of buying a new pen, and we replaced the razor blades in a razor instead of throwing away the whole razor just because the blade got dull.

But we didn't have the green thing back in our day.

We walked up stairs, because we didn't have an escalator in every store and office building. We walked to the grocery store and didn't climb into a 300-horsepower machine every time we had to go two blocks.

But she was right. We didn't have the green thing in our day.

Back then, we washed the baby's diapers because we didn't have the throw-away kind. We dried clothes on a line, not in an energy gobbling machine burning up 220 volts -- wind and solar power really did dry the clothes. Kids got hand-me-down clothes from their brothers or sisters, not always brand-new clothing. But that old lady is right; we didn't have the green thing back in our day.

Back then, we had one TV, or radio, in the house -- not a TV in every room. And the TV had a small screen the size of a handkerchief (remember them?), not a screen the size of the state of Montana .

In the kitchen, we blended and stirred by hand because we didn't have electric machines to do everything for us.

When we packaged a fragile item to send in the mail, we used a wadded up old newspaper to cushion it, not Styrofoam or plastic bubble wrap.

Back then, we didn't fire up an engine and burn gasoline just to cut the lawn. We used a push mower that ran on human power. We exercised by working so we didn't need to go to a health club to run on treadmills that operate on electricity.

But we didn't have the green thing back then.

Back then, people took the streetcar or a bus and kids rode their bikes to school or walked instead of turning their moms into a 24-hour taxi service.

We had one electrical outlet in a room, not an entire bank of sockets to power a dozen appliances. And we didn't need a computerized gadget to receive a signal beamed from satellites 2,000 miles out in space in order to find the nearest pizza joint.

But isn't it sad the current generation laments how wasteful we old folks were just because we didn't have the green thing back then?

[Yankeejib]

It gets a lot better than this, trust me. What would you say about a municipality that charges a landowner the maximum allowable price to haul off asbestos waste under the pretense that it has to be handled/processed/incinerated according to EPA law, but then hauls it to directly the local transfer station and dumps it in the regular garbage? Yeah, I've got pictures of that too. It would be a waste of my time to try to recoup my expense, but I'll bet the EPA gets a big hoot out of those pictures with clear images of the truck number and date/time stamps. Yeah, you can trust government.

[bbqgrill]

I sent a few emails to various people at the city with the attached photograph. We'll see what they have to say about it before I start calling the news media.

As for AMSig35seven's comment about the whole concept of recycling, I'm not sure what to say. I don't really want to turn this thread into a long argument about it. But there are people who don't believe man landed on the moon, there are people who believe that a Prius produces more pollution than a hummer, people who think the earth is only 6,000 years old, people who believe smoking won't cause cancer, and then there are people who think recycling consumes more energy and resources than it saves. I lump all of those beliefs into a big group of people who believe what they want to believe because it suits their purpose.

I'll admit recycling isn't always the most economical way to go about things, depending on the material. For example, copper is worth a lot of money because it is scarce. So it is profitable to recycle. Plastic, on the other hand, is very cheap. So it may cost as much or more money to recycle it than it does to make new stuff out of oil. But that doesn't mean it is more damaging to the environment. Also many of the larger cities no longer have space for landfills, so every bit they can recycle benefits them. Some day, hundreds of years from now, when oil becomes very scarce and expensive I wouldn't be surprised to see people digging up old landfills so that they can recycle all of those TV dinner containers and water bottles that we all throw out today.

You were on a roll till you hit the Prius thing.