VALDOSTA – The City of Valdosta has no plans to resume curbside recycling, opting instead for drop off locations.
Not everyone thinks that's a good idea.
City Public Works Director Richard Hardy said recycling volumes have been the same, if not better since halting curbside pickup, but there is some debate about exactly what the data reveals.
As of now, he said, there are no plans to return to curbside pickup for recyclable materials within the city limits.
The City of Valdosta recycling program collects glass, plastic, cans, paper and cardboard, all of which Hardy said are being treated and sorted better by residents at the drop-off sites.
“We’re getting cleaner material,” he said. “Even though we have some people throwing mattresses and wood products, getting it mixed in at some of the sites, more or less the material we’re collecting that people are bringing out and dumping in, we’re getting (more of it).”
Hardy said there were a lot of issues with curbside pickup as it was, and sanitation fees were definitely going to increase as a result.
Sanitation fees as a whole includes yard trash removal, garbage disposal, etc., with recycling in it as an extra perk; however, it became more of a cost than a revenue, he said.
“When we were at your home site, the only thing we could do then and there is pick it up and dump it all in one place,” Hardy said. “We had no option of pulling the glass out (and) pulling the cardboard out.” The manpower isn’t there, he said
The recycling process consisted of six individuals picking up the materials that were sometimes assorted and sometimes not.
They would go from street to street where one to two people or the entire street would be recycling.
“We found out through our audit that only 21% of the entire city was actually recycling,” he said. “But we still have to maintain and service the entire city. That’s just the cost of doing business.”
According to a recycling presentation at the 2021 Strategic Summit for Valdosta City Council, the 21% accounts for 3,694 homes out of the 16,998 in the city. That’s 402 homes in District 1, 328 homes in District 2, 233 homes in District 3, 770 homes in District 4, 1,142 homes in District 5 and 819 homes in District 6.
A look at city statistics, however, shows curbside pickup had an edge over the drop sites.
Curbside pickups resulted in 49.60 tons of recyclables a month in comparison to the drop sites at 48.50 tons — a difference of 1.10 tons.
Curbside pickup was also responsible for 595.20 tons recycled a year while drop sites recycle 48.50 tons per year — a difference of 13.20 tons.
Hardy said what he called "contamination percentages" and program costs showed the city a different story and factored into its decision to not resume curbside pickup.
Curbside pickups contained 20% contamination — drop sites, he said, only render 3% contamination — and cost the city $501,744 with recyclablescosting $843 per ton on average. Contamination, for example, is glass jars or plastic containers that still have food or product residue inside of them.
The drop sites only cost the city $233,100 with recyclables costing only $401 per ton on average.
Essentially, Hardy said city vehicles ran routes throughout the city to get pickup materials from a relatively small percentage of the population, and then couldn’t even effectively sort the recyclables out.
When these recyclables aren’t sorted out, someone must be paid to dispose of it. When the materials are separated, it becomes a revenue stream, he said.
Halting that process, which the city did in 2020 because of the COVID-19 pandemic, was the right idea even if they didn’t know it at the time, city officials argued, because it saved residents from increased costs.
With people just dropping off their recyclables, there was no need for an increase in manpower to sort them. People began sorting it out themselves and more people recycled in general, they suggested.
Hardy said so far feedback has been positive.
“People can recycle as much as they want, as often as they want, seven days a week, 24/7,” he said. “We have one or two that still prefer that convenience where we’d come to their doorstep and pick up that 18- to 19-gallon cart and empty it.”
But that's not how everyone sees it.
Setting an example
Ever since the city halted curbside pickup, some residents have asked when it would return, what they could do to bring it back or to just bring it back in general.
Judith Joseph is a Lowndes County resident who lived in Valdosta for 40-50 years.
She was used to recycling via curbside service but got out of the habit when she moved to the county. Upon finding the Five Points drop-off site last year, she got back into the habit.
She said she comes to drop off her recycling once a week because she believes it's an important action to take for the planet and serves as an example to her children and grandchildren.
Joseph recently learned the city halted its curbside service for recycling and believes it should start back up. The City of Valdosta is missing the opportunity to take recycling more seriously, she said.
"I always thought it was a good lesson for your children to take the bin out," she said. "They were aware of why you were taking that recycling to the curb (and) it was just so convenient — too convenient for anybody not to (recycle)."
She appreciates the drop-off points but the education and availability of recycling needs to be rethought and improved.
Valdosta resident Tom Hochschild said he agreed with her points, especially on the revamping of the drop-off points' setup. Hochschild visits the Five Points drop-off site to recycle and he's found certain parts of it a hazard.
For example, there are no back safety bars for the steps even while both the steps and the recycling containers reside on an incline. People could slip, fall and hurt themselves in rainy or sunny conditions, he said.
There's a lack of lighting sources for people who come to empty their recyclables in the evenings.
As far as making the drop-off sites better, Hochschild said the high walls of the recycling containers could be lowered to help people who struggle to get their recyclables over them now, handicap accessibility should be added, as well as a canopy for the area when people recycle during inclement weather, and the safety issues should be addressed.
Most of all, Hochschild said curbside service for recycling needs to be brought back. He understands there's a high cost to bringing it back but said the benefits outweigh the cost. When we talk about economic costs, there are other costs, he said.
"When you don't have recycling, what that ends up doing is it ends up getting into the landfills, then the landfills fill up more quickly, then you have to dig more holes and create more landfills," Hochschild said. "There's always going to be a cost."
He said he knows there are a lot of people who are willing to pay to bring back the curbside recycling service. What the city has for recycling is OK, he said, but it could be a lot better.
Resident Michael Noll is not convinced about the effectiveness of the drop-off locations for multiple reasons.
He sees residential garbage cans overstuffed on trash pickup days, many times overflowing with items which could — and he says should — be recycled.
Making it less convenient and more difficult for people to recycle does not create a culture which encourages recycling, he said.
He has also taken numerous photos at the city drop-off location at Five Points being used as a dumping site for large household materials that are not recyclable, including appliances and furniture.
Places to go
The current drop-off locations include Five Points Shopping Center, the city lot on Hill Avenue and the city lot at the corner of South Lee Street and East Savannah Avenue.
Hardy said he doesn’t expect more than 80% of materials to get recycled (because of contamination).
Miller Recycling buys recycled cardboard and mixed paper, and glass is being held onto for an incoming local recycling company.
Single-stream recycling is utilized for plastics, cans and excess mixed paper, cardboard and glass. These items are then sent to Synergy, a Cordele-based recycling facility.
The city budgeted money for Fiscal Year 2022 to identify and purchase another drop site, and purchase more recycling containers to expand the amount of materials recycled.
“The only reason we’re where we’re at right now is we want to create a sustainable recycling process so that it doesn’t matter if the market goes up and down, we can still move that material,” Hardy said.
