Downtown to be surveyed on recycling

Volunteers of Main Street Washington will soon begin surveying downtown residents about the possibility of recycling service. Residents of Washington pay $4.35 per month on their water bill to pay for recycling and the spring clean-up. However, residents who live in those areas of town zoned commercial, such as the downtown, do not receive curb-side pickup. Suzanne Ackermann, a volunteer who serves on Main Street?s design committee, wants to find out how many downtown residents would use recycling if it were offered to them.

Ackermann said she will begin contacting landlords in the super square to ask permission to speak with their tenants. She said she wants to speak to the tenants face-to-face about whether they?re interested in recycling and how far they would go to utilize it. She said she hopes to start canvassing residents before Thanksgiving.

?I want to find out what items they would recycle the most,? she said. ?Are they recycling mostly junk mail, bottles or cans? I will try to find out what they where they would like the recycling to be collected, such as out their back door, across the street or anywhere in the downtown.?

Ackermann said she and the other volunteers in Main Street want to collect as much information as possible about the residents? desires so that they can present that information to the city council.

?We don?t want to dump a request on somebody without having thought it through first,? she said. ?I want to make sure I?m extremely accurate. I don?t want to deal in emotions. I want to find the truth, and I want equity. I?m desperate for recycling myself. I live downtown, and I have to take all my recycling and load it in my car.?

Residents are allowed to take their recycling to the Washington County Recycling Center on Lexington Boulevard.

Ackermann said the canvassing would take several months since she would do all of it in her spare time. She said she also plans to have her survey translated into Spanish.

?I have every intention of connecting with all the residents in the downtown,? she said. ?We?re laying the groundwork right now. The only bad thing is that we?ll be ready to start just when the weather is getting ugly.?

Mayor Sandra Johnson said that she has discussed the issue of downtown recycling with the city council?s sanitation committee a number of times. One idea that the committee has considered is to purchase a trailer with compartments for each type of recycling, and to move the trailer from alley to alley around the downtown. The four kinds of recyclables are cardboard and paper, glass, metal and plastic. She said the expense of the trailer would be just under $10,000.

Main Street volunteer Mary Patterson, who is also on the design committee, said the issue of downtown recycling has been discussed many times over the years. She said Main Street will have a better idea of the need for downtown recycling after the survey is conducted.

?We?re treating one neighborhood differently than another,? she said. ?Besides, the city has issues with the amount of trash going to the landfill. This will be a way to get those recyclables into the recycling stream.?