Recycling gaining favor in Sandpoint

SANDPOINT — Six months into things, how well is the new Waste Management recycling program working for local residents? According to the people on the ground, it has been a resounding success.

“The guy who picks up the garbage has noticed a decrease in the amount he picks up and I’ve noticed an increase in my recycling,” said Ed Barba, who drives a Sandpoint pickup route for the company. “People are moving forward with recycling.”

One reason is that those big, blue containers have made it easier for customers to take part in the program.

“Now you throw it into one container and leave the sorting to Waste Management,” said Robin Freedman, senior communications manager. “It’s more convenient and that’s generating higher rates of recycling.”

Dramatically higher, in Sandpoint’s case. From late October 2012, when the new system was launched, to mid-March, a total of 142 tons of recyclables was picked up at curbside. During the same period a year ago, that amount was 87 tons — an increase of more than 63 percent.

Waste Management believes it can get those numbers even higher once persistent misconceptions have been overcome.

“It’s easier for people to recycle than ever before, but I don’t know if people understand that and have embraced it,” Freedman said.

The ease comes compliments of a new, “single stream” recycling strategy, where all items are placed in one bin, dumped into a truck and sorted at the company’s high-tech Smart Center in Spokane (see sidebar). One of only about 100 such centers in the nation, the facility allows Waste Management to collect a wider assortment of recyclables than was possible using the smaller green totes.

Those 14-gallon bins required customers to self-sort newspaper, cardboard, glass bottles, No. 1 and No. 2 plastic, milk jugs, aluminum and tin cans for pick-up. The 96-gallon carts that replaced them make it simple to toss all of the above into the container, along with miscellaneous glass items, most fiber and paper, plastics No. 1-7, as well as small tin or metal items and pots and pans.

The program has also made things simpler for route drivers, since they no longer have to get out and toss the sorted items into separate compartments on the truck. Using an automated system designed to increase safety for drivers, the recycling bins are snatched up by a mechanical arm and emptied into a dumpster-like bin at the front of the vehicle which, in turn, gets dumped into the back of the truck as it fills up.

“I like it a lot better and I think people enjoy the fact that they don’t have to sort it anymore,” said Barba. “It’s a win-win for customers and the company — and for me.”

The win, for Waste Management, comes in the form of a transition away from dumping garbage into landfills and toward sending more tonnage to recycling centers. Which brings up the second-most-common misconception — that recycling was some kind of sham and that everything collected actually ended up in the landfill anyway.

“I think there are some people who might still think that, but it’s not accurate,” Freedman said. “If Waste Management only had a landfill strategy, we’d be out of business.

“We made a strategic decision in 2007 to move away from garbage,” she continued. “We realized that, if we were going to survive, we’d have to make the shift toward recycling.”

Sandpoint resident Erik Daarstad has been a fan of the recycling program from the time his first green bin was dropped off in his driveway. He’s an even bigger cheerleader now that the new program is in place.

“From my standpoint, it’s a lot easier,” he said. “Plus, they take things like junk mail and all plastics. It sure works for me.

“My daughter lives out of town, where they don’t have a recycling program,” he added. “So she brings all of hers in and puts it in my blue bin.”

Like others, Daarstad had heard the rumors about recycling ending up in landfills, but forged on with the program nonetheless. His reward, he said, is the knowledge that he is now personally responsible for sending less material in that direction as his recycling outpaces his trash.

“I definitely have less garbage now,” he said. “I don’t even put my trash bin out every week anymore, because it would take me a month to fill it up.”

In an example of inverse proportion, Ed Barba feels like his increasingly full recycling truck is also making a difference.

“Trying to save the world, right?” he said, swinging up into the cab to continue his morning rounds. “A little bit at a time.”