The city pays too much to dispose of trash because we, the residents, don't recycle enough, according to McCheese.
Here is the list of plastics the city doesn't accept for recycling:
No plastic tubs, toys, bags, wraps,
styrofoam, prepared food containers or any food packaging

Getting the residents to recycle more is not the problem. Getting the city to accept more recycling is the problem, IMO. Children from families who recycle are already interested in recycling. Does anyone think that parents who bring their kids to fights, by car, are going to start recycling because their kids say so? What would be nice, would be having more types of plastic picked up curbside, for those households who wish to recycle more. Our high-priced leaders cannot figure out a way to do this, to recycle more plastics than bottles and jugs. Can't we ever be ahead of the curve, on anything?

The city should accept anything with the recycling emblem on it.

not enough recycling....hahahahahahahahahahahah,,,,,,hahahahahahahahahahahaha.....compared to GE/SI?

hahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha

you don't have to recycle because when on services it's ALL disposable and not manageable....

systemic systemic systemic......

The mayor and his dem team are doing a wonderful job in the city, right?   Well someone has said that many times.

If the mayor and his dem team had a brain, they would STOP going after the financially struggling hoomeowners for code violatons of house numbers not the correct size of the "dictatorship" of McCheese, or slight peeling paint, and instead use their efforts to go after those who fail to separate trash.

Mandate clear bags only, then if the trash collectors see recyclables in with the trash, they don't take it and they put a citation on the house.  Cite ANYONE who does NOT have trash in a covered can.  In the 2 and 3 family houses the cans should be numbered "100 Such and such Ave downstairs" and that could help identify which TENANT is failing to do something right.

I prefer to hold tenants responsible for that first.  The landlords can address that in the lease, stating the city holds tenants responsible."  If it's not separated the tenant gets cited, the landlord is notified and the landlord can use that as grounds for eviction and just get the judges to ignore the bleeding hearts who will cry "we don't  have anyplace to go."  

I'm probably overlooking something with that idea.  OK, there are landlords who are slum who wouldn't care whether it's trash or decrepit stairs or broken windows, etc, they wouldn't take any steps to address trash sorting.  But there are good landlords and maybe that would help get better tenants.

Bit then, this team of leaders in the city can't even successfully rid the city of those who store their trash cans in front or side of their houses, how long was Joe Allen complaining about that?  And the city dems would not do anything about that.

I agree more items should be recycled, like those tubs that aren't.  

Perhaps the good people in the city could make a statement, such as those wh are on this board, go ahead and start cleaning out those tubs and lids, etc, anything with a recycle symbol on it, put it in your recycle can.  Let the city scratch their heads.

Maybe it's all a lost cause.  A year of a taxpayer funded TV show running almost 24-7 and it was unsuccessful in getting more people to recycle.

Now the mayor is trying to use child based idea.  OK, fine, if his idea is appropriate for school, but really, do you think a bunch of kids going home telling mom and/or dad to recycle is going to increase the recycling?  How successful are the schools at getting lots of these parents to come in for a meeting about junior's attendance, undone homework (oh, they don't get homework anymore), poor grades, etc

I'd bet many of the people who may talk at POF could give ideas but the mayor thinks he is the almighty and only he and his fellow dems can do good for the city so he won't listen to any of the people that live in aand pay taxes for the city.  The city ony cares about downtown.


  

Maybe if the City got out of the refuse business, REAL garbage companies could better deal with the major 'recycling' problem plaguing the City (what a load of cr*p that is!!)

Sure, some people wouldn't hire a company, would leave their trash out, but then the City could collect FINES for those individuals. And we all know how much McCarthy loves to fine the taxpayers!!

Get out of the garbage racket and let the qualified businesses do it right!!!!!

Quoted from Hawthorn

Maybe if the City got out of the refuse business, REAL garbage companies could better deal with the major 'recycling' problem plaguing the City (what a load of cr*p that is!!)

Sure, some people wouldn't hire a company, would leave their trash out, but then the City could collect FINES for those individuals. And we all know how much McCarthy loves to fine the taxpayers!!

Get out of the garbage racket and let the qualified businesses do it right!!!!!

That would probably be a good idea, but people of the city, many of them, expect government to do everything for them.  ']

In the case of rental properties, if the landlord has to provide the service and doesn't pa (like many don't pay their taxes) then what happens, trash builds up.

Or in the case of renters, if the tenants have to hrie the company and they don't pay, then the trash builds up.

I guess in two family houses, perhaps the cheap non-paying tenant will sneak their trash in the can of the other tenant and then what if the cheap tenant puts recycles in with the trash can, or vice versa.

If the privates don't collect because rules being broke the trash piles up.  Then what?   The city charges the property owner (as opposed to the tenant), the slumlords won't care, or the landlord will try to evict the tenant and then that takes time and you get the bleeding hearts that could stop an eviction, but even in a normal eviction, what happens during that month or so, actually more than a month, if trash starts building up the city would have to find the problem issue the citation, allow 30 days for resolution, and then maybe the landlord has to evict and that can take 30 days at least.

I know we have private here in town but generally responsible owners.  What does the town do if anything, if cans sit at a curb for weeks?  If they overflow, etc?  I don't know but would be interested in kowing.  Does Rotterdam have all good landlords for those properties that are rental (but not big apartment complexes?)

You can't really go after the tenant, because you can't get blood from a stone. I wish it were otherwise, I would like for renters to have to pay a trash fee that goes up, directly, but that won't work.
We already had recycling rules in place, for years, but enforcement is haphazard. I know for fact of one case where a business owner was bringing trash to a relative's house, to get the 'free' pickup, and he was caught, but got away with it.
Too many slum properties with fly-by-night tenants is the problem. Landlords down in the city have a building super who handles the trash. If you want to put it into a lease for a tenant to do it, that is great, but you need both responsible tenants and a responsible landlord for that to work. I know one dedicated renter, the owner used to live in the building but moved out, she got sick of having to always take the new tenants' fast food trash out of the recycling, and always being the one to put all the trash out, or it piled up. She moved. I can see where this situation could lead to stabbings in some neighborhoods.
Anyway, as it stands now, they only accept plastic bottles and jugs. That isn't good enough, and we pay them enough to come up with a better solution than to enlist little ones to have to go picking through the garbage for bleach jugs, etc.

McCarthy has to try to fine  property owners for not Recycling because he needs money to pay for the TAJ Mahal on Foster Ave. The Dems make poor financial decisons and the taxpayers are the ones left to pay for it!

Yes, exactly. I would have liked to have a well-run recycling system in place all along, but I really resent his trying to blame residents for the city's inability to manage money, saying that we "don't recycle enough". Parking meters, garbage, all penny-ante stuff to make up for that money-sucking blackhole that is downtown, and that really stupid garage decision, made largely by and for people who don't even live here and don't have to pay for their mistakes.

almost everyone we know DOES NOT recycle ANYTHING....AND NEVER DID. Everything goes in the garbage. The only time they MIGHT use their recycling bin is when their garbage container is full..........REALLY!!!

Most folks just don't have time to wash and crush cans and separate their plastics and green bottles and clear bottles...blah blah blah.

It's all insane!

Quoted from Madam X

You can't really go after the tenant, because you can't get blood from a stone.

Oh, I forgot to really address that.

So there are landlords that are absentee/slum and they wouldn't bother paying for trash, so it wouldn't be colletected by privates.

So there are tenants that wouldn't care to pay and their trash wouldn't be collected by privates.

So is the city stuck with the very expensive city trash collection which DOES cot much more than the private haulers (the cheerleaders for the mayor and his dem team have not provided a shred of evidence to the contrary---because they can't find any).  The city collection so expensive with it's lavish pay and benefits, the baking the cans around til they break and the inability to cut costs through mandatory recycling

How about put the welfare people to work opening up trash bags and separating trash in exchange for the big pay they get (not just cash, the total of the non cash value easily puts them way above poverty).

Oh wait, the ACLU would be all over the city

And that Rembert lady and her tenants group would be screaming too, she'd bring Acorn in.

If a fairy or genie granted the Mayor a wish and increased the recycling rate to 50% of all garbage would it save the city money?  The answer is No because in order to meet the increased supply of recycleable material they would have to hire more staff, buy more trucks, make more separate trips.  More benefits, more retirement, more garages, more work boots etc.  More trucks on the road means more accidents.....

Want a program that works, pay the residents market rates for clean separated recycleables and there will be results.  

This article below covers many of the issues why recycling isnt always worth it.  http://www.crainsnewyork.com/article/20130424/POLITICS/130429935