Elgin doing better with recycling in pilot program

For some residents all it took was a letter from the city to get the message: Plastic bags are not recyclable in Elgin. Others needed to be told repeatedly via red tags affixed to their recycling carts.

Overall, the results of the pilot program have been positive, with a 33 percent reduction in recycling contamination along three test routes, Elgin senior management analyst Dan Ault said. "There is a trend, and it has continued, where the stops with contamination have continued to drop off - which is a good sign."

Elgin is one of two cities in the country that have partnered with Waste Management for the pilot program, said Lou Ferruzza, the company's local district manager. "I think we've seen some really good results in Elgin," he said. "I'm pleasantly surprised so far."

About 2,700 households throughout Elgin were selected for the program that started in January.

First, residents got a letter in English and Spanish asking them to recycle all papers, empty cans and plastic bottles, remove food and liquids, and refrain from putting plastic bags in recycling carts.

Plastic bags cannot be recycled via Waste Management, but can be recycled at stores such as Jewel, Meijer and Wal-Mart.

That was enough for northeast side resident Rebecca Hunter. "I'm so fanatic I bring stuff from work to recycle, because they don't recycle anything except corrugated cardboard," she said. "But until I got the letter, I thought plastic bags were OK to recycle."

The second step of the program is to affix bilingual tags on recycling bins; red tags mean Waste Management drivers found contamination, green tags are for residents who improved their recycling behavior, Ault said.

About half the households required a red tag at some point, and 99 households required four or more red tags, Ault said. "We will present the results to the sustainability commission. Eventually we will likely expand the pilot program."

The third and final step - which hasn't been enacted yet - would be to not pick up contaminated carts, Ferruzza said. "The tag would say, 'It was contaminated, unfortunately we cannot service it (the home) today,' " he said. "But we are still in that mode of working with residents."

Waste Management drivers also are part of the education effort, Ault said. "People are actually coming out to talk to the drivers, saying, 'I didn't know this wasn't recycling,' " he said.

Waste Management doesn't have results of the second pilot program, which is taking place in Antelope Valley, California, Ferruzza said.