Background And Summary

Background

Recycling of materials, which in previous decades had been burned or buried, is a strategy that makes eminent environmental sense in the 21st century. Recycling helps prevent the squandering of irreplaceable natural resources and reduces the environmental burdens of landfilling and incineration. Perhaps in no other American city is a successful recycling program more urgently needed than here in New York City, where earlier this year Sanitation Department officials closed the City's last active landfill -- the massive Fresh Kills dump on Staten Island. The fact that most of the trash that formerly went to Fresh Kills is now being sent by truck to out-of-state landfills and incinerators means that, in addition to wasting resources that could otherwise be reclaimed, the city is exporting, along with its trash, the pollution problems that come with garbage burning, landfilling and long-haul diesel truck shipments of waste.

Recycling also makes long-term economic sense for New York. Since the City's recycling program began here in 1989, recycling has become much more efficient (due in part to changes in waste collection scheduling, the introduction of two-bin refuse trucks and increased participation in recycling by New Yorkers). Over this same period, with the phase-out of Fresh Kills and the export of over 10,000 tons of trash a day to landfills as far away as Virginia, the costs of burying or burning waste have mounted. Overall, the City's solid waste budget has climbed over $300 million in just the last 4 years -- a result almost exclusively of the costs of exporting garbage.¹ A recent audit by New York City Comptroller Alan G. Hevesi confirms that the costs of recycling, compared to the costs of landfilling or incinerating New York City's trash, have been steadily decreasing in recent years.² Significantly, Sanitation Department officials now concede that within this decade, the costs of recycling will actually be lower than those for disposing of New York's waste in landfills.³

Meanwhile, recycling continues to enjoy strong public support. For example, according to an independent poll conducted several years ago by the John Zogby Organization for NRDC, an overwhelming majority of New Yorkers -- 82 percent of the 308 residents polled -- supported an expansion of recycling efforts in New York City. The support for expanded recycling stretched across gender, race, and religious lines, extended to all five boroughs, and occurred regardless of political affiliation.⁴

But supporting expanded recycling means little if citizens do not have the basic information they need to participate effectively in the program. Measures to educate the public as to how and what to recycle are essential for a successful operation. In its landmark 1989 recycling law, the City Council specifically recognized this fact when it required New York City to, among other things, "develop and implement an educational program…using flyers, print and electronic advertising, public events, promotional activities, public service announcements, and such other techniques as the [Sanitation] Commissioner determines to be useful, to assure the greatest level of compliance" with the recycling law.⁵ This issue has remained a priority of the City Council, which has continued to push for enhanced funding and additional programs for recycling public education efforts over the years.

To its credit, the Sanitation Department ("DOS") has taken steps to familiarize New Yorkers with the basic elements of the City's recycling program. Among other things, the Department has undertaken an extensive program of mailing recycling information to individual households and building managers throughout the City. DOS staff have spoken at numerous public meetings, street fairs, association events and school assemblies. And the Department has placed recycling education ads in newspapers and on radio and television broadcasts in New York City. In total, the City has spent more than $49 million between fiscal years 1994 and 2001 to educate New Yorkers about recycling.⁶

Despite such efforts, ongoing concerns have been expressed by the City Council's Environmental Protection Committee and solid waste advocates as to the effectiveness of some program elements. In the early to mid-1990's, a major concern was that changing rules for what materials New Yorkers were required to recycle was undercutting recycling education efforts. Lack of uniformity in the frequency of recycling collections, and cutbacks to weekly collections in most city neighborhoods, added to the confusion. In recent years, the Sanitation Department's animated television advertisements have been criticized as being too general and failing to provide necessary information on the specifics of precisely what materials are to be recycled.

Summary

To gauge the effectiveness of the City's public education efforts, NRDC recently commissioned an independent polling company, the Marist Institute for Public Opinion ("MIPO"), to conduct a city-wide poll of New York City residents. The survey of 918 New Yorkers was conducted by MIPO from June 12 through June 19, 2001. The survey revealed that despite the Sanitation Department's good faith efforts to date, the DOS public education program on recycling is failing to effectively educate New Yorkers on precisely what and how to recycle. This is particularly disappointing because, as noted above, public interest in and support for recycling in New York City is strong and because the economic case for recycling continues to strengthen.

Among the major findings of the Marist Institute survey:

• Only 4 of the 12 household items in the Marist survey were correctly identified by a majority of New Yorkers as being recyclable or non-recyclable.
  
  
• Confusion persists over what is recycled under the City's program, with a significant number of residents incorrectly identifying six items that should be recycled.
  
  
• A majority of New Yorkers did not correctly identify six items in the Marist survey as garbage when these items should in fact be placed out with the regular trash and are not recyclable.
  
  
• Only 0.03 percent of New Yorkers correctly identified all 12 items as either recyclables or non-recyclables.
  
  
• 59 percent of New Yorkers stated that the City is doing a "fair" or "poor" job of educating residents about the specifics of the Sanitation Department's recycling program, while only 41 percent thought the City's efforts were "good" or "excellent."

In Part II of this report, NRDC describes the results of the Marist Survey in more detail. Then in Part III, NRDC sets forth six recommendations for City Sanitation officials.

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Notes

1. City of New York Independent Budget Office, "Overview of the Waste Stream Managed by the NYC Department of Sanitation," February 2001, p. 12.

2. City of New York Office of the Comptroller, Bureau of Management Audit, "Audit of the New York City Department of Sanitation's Recycling Program," June 29, 2001, p. 47.

3. New York Times, "The Big City: The Negatives of Recycling in New York," August 8, 2000.

4. Natural Resources Defense Council, "WasteWatch 1997 Report on New York City's Recycling Program," November 1997.

5. Admin Code of N.Y.C. §16-315(b).

6. Robert Lange, Director of Bureau of Waste Prevention, Reuse and Recycling, New York City Department of Sanitation. The number for FY 2001 is estimated.