Dale Martin
City Manager
July 15, 2016 1:00 a.m.
Several months ago, due to repeated abuse, I directed City staff to remove the containers associated with the City’s recycling site near Lime Street and 8th Street. Much too frequently, non-recyclable materials (furniture, tires, household waste, paint, etc.) were strewn around the site. Cardboard, perhaps the most deposited material, was also often improperly placed, especially when the containers were full (and despite signage stating to not dump anything on the ground). In other words, the site was treated by some as more a dump than a recycling center. The personnel and resources necessary to maintain the sightlines and functionality of the site became too burdensome.
Although the City’s waste hauler, Advanced Disposal, offers curbside recycling throughout the City, the logistics of curbside recycling present various challenges to many commercial operations, especially the small businesses located downtown: the storage and placement of the containers, the coordination of deliveries and disposal, the impact of collection upon business operations, and others. Downtown business operators have continued to express interest in the re-establishment of the recycling site. The desire of the businesses (and others) is further supported by the City’s Comprehensive Plan: Policy 4.04.05- The City will continue to fund and maintain a City Recycling Station for the collection of, at a minimum, cardboard, glass, plastics and aluminum materials.
A delay in the re-establishment of the recycling site was related to the determination by Advanced Disposal officials as to how to continue with its contract with the City. The current contract with the City expires in 2018. Costs associated with recycling have increased substantially over the past few years due to a variety of market forces. When Advanced Disposal officials approached the City Commission recently and described those additional costs, the City Commission offered two options: mutually terminate the contract and solicit new proposals or continue the contract until it expires. Advanced Disposal officials recently informed City officials that the current contract will be honored through 2018. With that decision, the City can now work with Advanced Disposal to re-establish a recycling site.
City staff has examined a variety of locations, primarily with the intent to provide a site to support downtown businesses and the desired need for cardboard recycling. Although cardboard recycling containers resemble “traditional” dumpsters in size, the recycling container to accommodate glass, plastic, and aluminum more appropriately resembles a larger roll-off container (slightly smaller than a semi-truck). To place and load such a container requires significantly more space than a simple dumpster, so downtown locations are obviously constrained.
The selected site for all of the recycling containers (cardboard, glass, plastics, and aluminum) is the southern end of what is commonly referred to as Parking Lot D, off of Front Street, south of Ash Street. This area has several benefits over the previous site near the City’s maintenance yard.
First, the site is closer to downtown businesses to accommodate the desire for cardboard recycling. Although closer, the site is also not located at a highly visible site downtown.
Second, the site provides more room for the containers and for vehicles to maneuver, including loading, unloading, and collecting the materials.
Third, although not necessarily visible to the downtown retail district, the site is more open to observation than the previous site. This openness will hopefully deter the dumping that marred the other site. As an added protection, the new site does have immediate access to power to support video surveillance.
Fourth, and finally, the containers can be easily and temporarily removed as needed during events and activities that occur in the general area.
As part of the next contract, more consideration related to a recycling site will be part of the contract discussions. I believe that recycling, in general, will be more exhaustively reviewed, both on the commercial and on the residential scales.
I hope that the new site is not subject to the same disappointing behavior that the previous site was: all materials should be properly placed in the appropriate container and non-recyclables properly disposed of elsewhere. Please take care of the new site, which should be operational within a few weeks.
Congrats on resolving this. A point not mentioned was that some rental properties also do not participate in the curbside program. As we are big recyclers at home, we took our stuff to the former location but were disappointed that we would have to pack ours up and take it home. Now we can use the new location.
I also hope the new location will not be subject to the abuse that often took place at the old site. Dale’s characterization of it often looking like a “dump site” and not a recycling center is spot on. Kudos to the City Manager for working with Advanced to come up with a solution for downtown businesses as well as residents. I personally believe much of the abuse came from non-City residents who do not have a mandated cycling program. In the past I have seen people unload their household garbage from the trunks of their cars and place them in the garbage cans at Peter’s Point and Burney Park. The problem isn’t unique to FB. While recently vacationing in the north GA mountains, I noticed their garbage disposal and recycling center was located inside a 10′ high fenced area with limited operating hours overseen by an attendant since “curbside” pickup wasn’t feasible in the area. Of course, some people still abused the program by dropping off their bagged garbage outside the fence if the facility wasn’t open.
At the same time, I am disappointed that an area that has been designated as part of the waterfront park will be used for this purpose. Perhaps in the future as the recreational needs in this area become more pressing, the recycling center could be moved over to the east side of Front Street to the triangular point of land owned by the City and Rayonier. It should offer the same logistical advantages of access and discrete visibility. Just a thought.