By Nathan Duke
City Council Speaker Christine Quinn (D-Manhattan) joined Councilman Peter Vallone Jr. (D-Astoria) at Astoria Park this week to announce a push for an expanded recycling program in public sites throughout the city.
The park, which is located along the Astoria waterfront, was selected by the Council in 2007 as a location for a public spaces recycling pilot program, Quinn said.
“We want New York City back in a leadership role for recycling,” Quinn said. “We will triple the amount of bins in the city and make it a permanent program. It will reduce our waste and make us money.”
The Council speaker said there is a $97 tipping fee per ton of trash removal in the city, whereas the fee for removal that same amount of recyclables is $67.
A bill to increase the number of recycling bins across the five boroughs has been introduced by Councilwoman Jessica Lappin (D-Manhattan). Elected officials tossed materials into a green bin labeled for newspapers and magazines as well as another blue bin for bottles and cans in Astoria Park.
“When I go into Key Food, bins are always overflowing with cans,” Vallone said of a neighborhood grocery store on 31st Street. “People want to recycle but they don’t know where to do it.”
Vallone’s father, former Council Speaker Peter Vallone, had originally sponsored and pushed through a 1989 recycling law which required that 50 percent of the city’s waste stream was recycled.
Quinn said there are currently 300 recycling bins in public spaces throughout the five boroughs. Lappin’s bill would add new bins in which to deposit glass, paper, plastic and aluminium recyclables.
The legislation would also include expanded plastic recycling, such as takeout containers and medicine bottles, as well as recycling for household hazardous waste and paint.
The bill would also require all schools operated by the city’s Education Department to provide receptacles in each classroom. All city agencies as well as city-owned and operated buildings would also have a recycling coordinator.
The containers would be distinctively colored, depending on the type of recyclable material, and placed near existing wastebaskets.
Quinn said the city would divert 8,000 tons of plastic every year away from landfills and incinerators.
“We know that people will recycle if they have the opportunity,” Lappin said. “By expanding public space recycling, we’ll ensure that New Yorkers who want to do the right thing actually can.”
Reach reporter Nathan Duke by e-mail at nduke@cnglocal.com or by phone at 718-260-4566.
