RecyclingMonster - Utahns across the Wasatch Front soon may shoulder an increase in the monthly fees they pay for recycling — a reality prompted by changing global conditions that mean it now costs many cities more money to recycle waste than to send it to a landfill.
The Wasatch Front Waste and Recycling District, one of the largest residential waste and recycling collectors in Salt Lake County, is asking its customers whether they would support continuing recycling services with a cost increase of $1.50 a month.
That’s an extra 75 cents over the cost of sending all items to the landfill.
The survey ends Monday, but Pam Roberts, the district’s executive director, said the results show early support so far, with more than two-thirds of the 5,700 community members who had responded as of July 22 indicating that they favor recycling.
“They understand the long-range importance for sustainability and not just the cost,” Roberts said of that outcome. “They’re looking past the short-term costs and [looking at] the long-term costs. And I think that was our hope. Don’t just think about right now. Think about the long range if we put everything into the landfill — what that does environmentally, but also what it does costwise. We’re going to have to ship it out somewhere.”
Wasatch Front Waste and Recycling’s service area includes Cottonwood Heights, Herriman, Holladay, Millcreek, Taylorsville, portions of Murray and Sandy, the metro townships of Copperton, Emigration, Kearns, Magna and White City, and unincorporated areas of Salt Lake County.
The municipalities represented on the district’s board are awaiting the results of the survey before they make changes to garbage fees, Roberts said, and any increase to the current $17 a month base fee would likely be made for fiscal 2020.
Millcreek warned residents in a newsletter earlier this month that its recycling service may be at risk of being discontinued. But Mayor Jeff Silvestrini said he’s heard from his constituents who don’t want that to happen.
“It’s very important to them,” he said. “I think people are distressed about the status of recycling in our world these days, and I think everybody’s hoping we can find solutions. So that’s why we, as a city, want to focus on educating our residents so they recycle properly, and we don’t end up sending stuff to the landfill.”
While cities used to get paid for their recycled materials, many now have to pay to recycle due to changing economic conditions in China, which takes much of the world’s recycling exports and has begun cracking down on high contamination rates in the United States.
Courtesy : www.sltrib.com
