Interesting article in the N&O this morning about anti-litter legislation that would create a refund deposit for plastic drink bottles of $0.10 per bottle. It faces a lot of opposition. I can't see why. The state spent $16.6 million picking this stuff up. If we create a deposit every kid out there will be collecting bottles themselves, which is almost a right of passage in my opinion. Our leaders are out of touch if they think that education via interstate billboards is going to change anyone's minds about littering. Anyway, read the article and then contact your representative and tell them to take this seriously. article: http://www.newsobserver.com/print/wednesday/city_state/story/640707.html NC State Legislature: http://www.ncga.state.nc.us/gascripts/counties/counties.pl?county=Johnston
Personally I'm in favour of it for just the reason Harvey mentioned. It's a right of passage for kids to get money by collecting bottles (and cans). Do, however, remember two things: 1. Don't sue the driver of the car that hit your kid on the side of the road while trying to collect a bottle worth a dime. 2. Don't complain when the cost of a twelve pack of sodas suddenly jumps up $1.20.
Let's see: 1) We have a litter problem. 2) Things do not get recycled the way they should. 3) The state should not have to pay to pick it up or educate the public about littering, because if you have half a brain or any respect for the earth, wildlife or your fellow citizen you wouldn't litter to begin with. 4) Kids are spoiled these days and have nothing better to do than smash my mailbox. This is not a TAX, although the cost would most likely be passed on to the consumer, of course. Where do you think the $16.6 million came from to pick up trash last year? Taxes, perhaps? This passes the cost of this burden on to the offenders and allows people who give a damn to benefit from their continued unwillingness to take their Mountain Dew to the nearest trash receptacle. If it passes you could make a mint along Cornwalis Rd alone.
According to what I've heard (as well as experiences in other states), there will be recycling centers (sort of reverse vending machines) placed in strategic locations where you will deposit your bottles and cans and receive the payout.
My 2 cents: I lived in a small town in Maine (where these deposits have been around for decades). The places to bring your recycled bottles were usually a haul. Storing these bottles (which you have to rinse out) can be a PITA if you don't live convenient to the drop off centers (which BTW were usually open from 8-4pm M-F While that small town I lived in had almost a negligible crime rate - I can't tell you how many reports from the police blotter included someones screen porch getting broken into and their deposit bottles stolen (by kids or drug users looking for untraceable items to cash in on) While you might scoff and say it was just a screen porch - personal property damage to a door is still just that. The streets and highways still had the same amount of litter and never once, in a good number of years I resided there, did I ever see kids going around collecting litter for money. The deposits back then were 2 - 5 cents depending on the can/bottle type - now they are talking 10 cents due to inflation - still - 10 cents doesn't buy you any more today than 5 cents did back in the 80's when I was a Maine resident. You can add it up anyway you want - the deposits made no difference to the litter situation there and it won't likely help us here. Only a few states have deposits on bottles and cans - think about it - if it was such a cure-all - a whole lot more would have gotten on the band wagon.
To quote GRIST ENVIRONMENTAL NEWS: "Deposit systems are an added hassle for beverage makers, packagers, and retailers. In a typical deposit scheme, the retailer pays the manufacturer -- let's say five cents per bottle. That price is passed on to the consumer, but when the consumer returns the bottle she gets back the five cents, and the same goes for a retailer. Often the retailer receives a handling fee upon return, as well. Glass bottles are often sterilized and refilled if they are in good condition, but everything else, of course, is recycled. If you were a store or a large corporation, would you rather deal with used containers or not? It's easy to paint a sort of Evil Corporation picture because major beverage companies have spent quite a bit of time directly lobbying against bottle bills and also -- scandale -- starting anti-littering campaigns in order to shift the focus of the discussion from producers to consumers. Keep America Beautiful was started by bottlers and packagers in the 1950s and has focused on what citizens can do to keep America clean ever since -- it's not bottles that cause litter, it's people that cause litter."
As much as we use cans/bottles etc. I would love to recycle and get some of the money back. The only thing that keeps me from recyling now is the fact that they want me to pay extra for it. I think that is completely backwards. On a side note, I cannot stand people who litter!! That is what the trash cans are for at the gas stations! I clean out my car everytime I fill up!
My trash collection company charges an extra $2 a month to recycle. Even I can afford that. So few people recycle, I'm sure they are taking a loss for doing it. I wonder if the county or state could do anything to provide an incentive for them to pick it up for free, and if more people would recycle if it were free? It seems as if it would be in the county's interest to encourage recycling, so they don't fill up the available landfill space. I wonder, if they had recycling containers for aluminum at convenience stores & other locations, how many people would use them? Maybe I'll do a poll on that. We should at least make an effort to recycle aluminum, that's the one thing that can have the biggest impact.
I remember about 25 years ago taking all my bottles to a grocery store in front of CARY VILLAGE MALL (remember that?) to get the deposits back. Does anyone know why NC stopped doing deposits in the first place?
Spot on, KDs. If more people recycled landfills would not be a prevalent and cost as much, nor would we need expensive clean up campaigns at taxpayers expense. Also, you can recycle for free at any JoCO convenience center. I bought a $12 bin from target and it gets filled up once a month with bottles, margarin tubs, newspaper, etc. I then take it to the convenience center on Barber Mill road on my next trip to the Sithfield outlet malls. Not recycling because it costs too much is a cop out for lazy people.
KD's I think if you rode through subdivisions daily, as I do, and end up behind some of these trucks, you would be quite angry to see that a number of them dump recyclables right in the same section as your trash :shock: Yup, some of them take that $2, pocket it and don't do anything different with recyclables than they do with dirty diapers. I've seen it with my own eyes, more than a few times. Which is why I'd never pay an extra dime to go through the trouble of rinsing, de-labeling and separating my plastic/glass/cans.
I use Republic Waste. They send a separate truck, completely different from the trash truck, for recycling. I do not have to separate it or remove labels. I do rinse out the cans and bottles, etc., but that just takes a second. I know that Waste Industries also picks up recyclables commingled, and they send them to a facility to be separated. When I lived in Selma, they would sometimes send a trash truck to pick up the recycling, which left the impression it was going to the landfill, but it did not. If the recycling truck was broken down, they would use one of the trash trucks, but pick up only recycling with that one. The Town of Selma later contracted their trash pickup and recycling out to Waste Industries. I value caring for the earth highly enough that I do not mind paying an extra $2.00 per month for recycling. I do what I can to reduce, reuse, and recycle.
Maybe so, but the bill will give others more incentive to clean up instead of the burden being on the state. If the cost is passed on to the consumer and those consumers litter so be it. I'll be there to pick it up and take their $0.10.
I think you are comparing society too much to your own family. I agree with Harvey that people will make more of an effort to pick recycle bottles up if they can cash them in.
It is not the $2 or $5 they charge extra to recycle it is the point that they charge extra. I think that is just backwards. I have no problems taking my recyleables to a recycle center or drop off, I just did not know where one is. Is the one still available at the gas station on Barber Mill you mentioned?
Your local government is nice enough to provide this service to you and also advertise it on their website. http://www.co.johnston.nc.us/mainpage.cfm?category_level_id=571&content_id=260
It would be nice if they would put recycling centers at more convenient locations around the county, like shopping center parking lots. Just something simple like the bins they have in some of the rest areas on the interstate highways. I'm not usually one to come to the defense of businesses, but I don't see any reason why trash collection companies should have to absorb the entire cost of picking up recycling. Of course, I suppose they could increase everybody's bill by $1 and give us all recycling bins. I seriously don't think there's any money to be made on recycling anything but aluminum. If they could make a profit on it, I'm sure they would be encouraging all of us to recycle.
