You don't have to live on land to recycle!
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Lunch and Learn |
TBA |
Calendar of Events |
JUNE |
Citywide Cleanup
Saturday, June 7
8am - 10:30ish
TBA
Sponsored by Last Stand
Green Drinks
Wednesday, June 11
5:30pm
http://www.greendrinks.org
keywestgreen@gmail.com |
JULY |
Citywide Cleanup
Saturday, July 5
8am - 10:30ish
TBA
Sponsorships by civic groups, clubs and organizations are available by contacting
Chris Belland cbelland@historictours.com
or Annalise Mannix amannix@kwcity.com |
AUGUST |
Citywide Cleanup
Saturday, August 2
8am - 10:30ish
TBA
Sponsored by Florida Keys Outreach Coalition |
SEPTEMBER |
Citywide Cleanup
Saturday, September 6
8am - 10:30ish
TBA
Sponsorships by civic groups, clubs and organizations are available by contacting
Chris Belland cbelland@historictours.com
or Annalise Mannix amannix@kwcity.com |
OCTOBER |
Citywide Cleanup
Saturday, October 4
8am - 10:30ish
TBA
Sponsored by GLEE |
NOVEMBER |
Citywide Cleanup
Saturday, November 1
8am - 10:30ish
TBA
Sponsored by Old Island Restoration Foundation |
DECEMBER |
Citywide Cleanup
Saturday, December 6
8am - 10:30ish
TBA
Sponsored by Historic Tours of America, Inc. |
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Adopt-An-Area |
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KEYS RECYCLING PALES TO 'FRISCO RATES
FELICITY BARRINGER
New York Times News Service
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SAN FRANCISCO — Mayor Gavin Newsom is competitive about many things, garbage included. When the city found out a few weeks ago that it was keeping 70 percent of its disposable waste out of local landfills, he embraced the statistic the way other mayors embrace winning sports teams, improved test scores or declining crime rates.
But the city wants more.
So Newsom will soon be sending the city’s Board of Supervisors a proposal that would make the recycling of cans, bottles, paper, yard waste and food scraps mandatory instead of voluntary, on the pain of having garbage pickups suspended.
“Without that, we don’t think we can get to 75 percent,” the mayor said of the proposal. His aides said it stood a good chance of passing.
Monroe County residents recycle a mere 6 percent of their garbage, well below the national
average of about 30 percent. Key West alone has realized a slight increase recently, and it’s paying off.
“Just going from 6 percent to 7.4 percent has already saved Key West $30,000 in fees,” Annalise Mannix, the city’s environmental programs coordinator, said in a press release issued last month for the city’s Earth Day celebration in Bayview Park. “If we can get to just 30 percent, the city will save $1 million.”
Students from Horace O’Bryant Middle School helped erect a Recycling Thermometer in the park that will monitor how much Key West recycles in the next year and how much savings it realizes, and the city gave away 100 recycling bins in hopes of encourage residents to do more. The city plans to erect a second sign, but has not determined where, Mannix said Friday.
Chris Belland, co-chairman of the Key West Chamber of Commerce’s “Love Your Island” program, said Key West’s small size should make recycling easier than in other places.
“San Francisco enjoys a recycling rate of over 70 percent,” he wrote in the Earth Day press release. “Surely, if a complex urban environment like San Francisco can do it, so can Key West.”
Jared Blumenfeld, San Francisco’s director of the city’s environmental programs, addressed one of the main reasons the city keeps up the pressure to recycle. “The No. 1 export for the West Coast of the United States is scrap paper,” Blumenfeld said, explaining that the paper is sent to China and returns as packaging that holds the sneakers, electronics and toys sold in big-box stores.
The city has 12 recycling streams, or programs, devoted to different materials, including regular garbage, construction debris, furniture and paint.
“When we look at garbage, we don’t see garbage, OK?” said Robert Reed, a spokesman for Norcal Waste Systems, the parent company of Sunset Scavenger and Golden Gate Disposal and Recycling Co., the main garbage collectors in the city. “We see food, we see paper, we see metal, we see
glass.”
Norcal’s subsidiaries handle 3,545 tons of waste a day in San Francisco, out of about 7,800 generated citywide, Reed said. About 55 percent of Norcal’s total goes to the landfill; the rest is recycled. These figures become part of the calculation of the city’s overall diversion rate of 70 percent, which is the figure it just reported for 2006.
With the exception of Chicago, which boasted a 55 percent rate in 2006 - the most recent year for which national comparisons are available — Eastern and Midwestern cities lagged well behind their California counterparts.
According to the most recent annual survey of the trade magazine Waste News, in 2006 New York City was at 30.6 percent, Milwaukee at 24 percent, Boston at 16 percent and Houston at 2.5 percent.
Citizen News Editor Cheryl Smith contributed to this report. |
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