Why don’t more people sign up for curbside recycling?
Published 7:43 pm Thursday, March 15, 2018
LaGrange Mayor Jim Thornton is three-fourths of the way through his town hall meetings tour, which are taking him into every part of the city.
Thursday night’s meeting at the Griggs Recreation Center included questions on several different topics, which was unlike Monday’s meeting where recycling was the main topic of discussion. On Monday, Thornton received question after question on the recycling program, making it clear that many in this community are passionate about it and want to see it succeed.
For anyone who missed the meeting or our recent stories on the program, here’s a question rundown. When the city launched curbside recycling in January 2016, the program was not expected to make money. The city projected around 1,500 households to sign up, but the program has underperformed that projection to this point.
Around 1,000 households are currently registered, but until a recent campaign that number was around 850.
Several suggestions were made during Monday night’s meeting. Several citizens said they don’t understand what they can recycle, others complained about the red tag placed on bins when the wrong material is recycled. The city should take all of that information into consideration and improve the program.
Outside of that, we think Thornton is right when he says that the city has done a lot for this program, and its long-term future will be determined by the citizens of LaGrange.
To be frank, we’re not sure why many choose not to take part.
It costs nothing, and it benefits the environment.