Last place, for
the third year in a row
The state of Rhode Island’s Resource Recovery Center will actually pay us to recycle. In fact, every year at this time, they distribute checks to RhodeIsland municipalities to reflect the profits on selling the amount of waste they deliver to the Johnston landfill’s recycling center.
However,
it’s becoming a regular annual story that, like
the past two years, Charlestown got the smallest check. Four years ago, the
only town to do worse than Charlestown was West Greenwich.
With
town leadership dominated by the Charlestown Citizens Alliance (CCA Party) who
claim the mantle of environmentalism for their own, why is it that we suck so
badly at recycling? We’ll get back to that, but let’s take a closer look at the
numbers.
What
makes this year different is the new lengths the town, with the help of the
RIRRC, has
been trying to gloss over its dismal performance.
They want you to use a different measure of comparison, rather than the
simplest and most obvious by noting that Charlestown’s record is not really so
terrible.
If
you turn the numbers so that you look at them in a certain light at a certain
angle, “You’ll see that Charlestown
actually fairs [SIC] extremely well
when compared to other communities. It is *this* measure-waste
generation-that is important, not a town’s recycling rate, which is dependent
on many variables.”
That’s
what RIRRC public relations officer Sarah Kite wrote to me in an e-mail. Sure
you can. Indeed, you can torture any data to make it tell you just about
anything you want. When her agency first issued their “new and improved” way of
looking at municipal recycling, it was pretty easy to tear that analysis to
shreds, as I did here.
But I like to look at the bottom line – the tonnage of recyclables we collected and the amount we were paid. We actually don’t know how much waste gets generated in Charlestown. Only one out of six waste-generating properties in Charlestown hold permit stickers allowing them to take waste to the Charlestown transfer station.
Five
out of every six Charlestown property owners have their waste, including
recyclables, picked up by private haulers.
Private haulers are barred from taking Charlestown waste to the Charlestown transfer station. They must either take it to Westerly or South Kingstown, or schlep it up to Johnston.
Private haulers are barred from taking Charlestown waste to the Charlestown transfer station. They must either take it to Westerly or South Kingstown, or schlep it up to Johnston.
So,
frankly, because only one-sixth of Charlestown property owners use the transfer
station, we just simply don’t know how we are doing in terms of real waste
generation or recycling. We do know that for three years running, we have been the worst in the state in terms of tonnage and profit-sharing.
Charlestown
expects private haulers who pick up
from Charlestown customers to give Charlestown “credit” for the waste even
though we won’t let them use our facilities. Most don’t. If you were them,
would you?
What
are left with are the numbers provided by the state which offer a much simpler
and, I believe, a more honest way of looking at Charlestown compared to its
peers. They are also the only tangible numbers available.
I
look at the actual tonnage and the actual money paid by RIRRC so we can then
compare ourselves to towns with similar populations and conditions. For
example, there are seven Rhode Island towns with smaller populations than
Charlestown. These are Block Island, Exeter, Foster, Jamestown, Little Compton,
Richmond and West Greenwich.
All
of them use transfer stations and a mix of private haulers. All of them are
rural. Most of them have a high percentage of part-time residents, tourists and
people who come to local events. All have a fairly low concentration of
commercial businesses. Given that they face pretty much the same conditions and
challenges as Charlestown, you would reasonably expect their tonnage of
recyclables to be smaller than Charlestown.
Except
they are not. This past year, Charlestown recycled less than 400 tons. All of
the seven smaller towns recycled more than 400 tons. Indeed, except for West
Greenwich, all of these smaller towns recycled more than 500 tons. Richmond
recycled 802 tons, more than double Charlestown’s with 100 fewer people. Exeter
recycled 719 tons with 1,400 fewer people.
Let’s
look at Charlestown and the seven towns with smaller populations to see how
they did based on the state’s numbers.
Population
|
Tons
recycled
|
Tons
per person
|
Comparison
to last year
|
|
Charlestown
|
7,827
|
397
|
0.05
|
+16%
|
West
Greenwich
|
6,135
|
416
|
0.07
|
-5%
|
Foster
|
4,606
|
515
|
0.11
|
+13%
|
Block
Island
|
1,051
|
567
|
0.54
|
-3%
|
Exeter
|
6,425
|
719
|
0.11
|
+7%
|
Richmond
|
7,708
|
802
|
0.1
|
+38%
|
Jamestown
|
5,405
|
970
|
0.18
|
+8%
|
The
US EPA estimates that
there is one ton of waste for every man, woman and child. One ton is a nice
number to use for comparison. Using EPA’s estimate, you can reasonably expect
Charlestown to generate around 8,000 pounds of residential waste, but according to the RIRRC, we recycle 397 tons or around 5%.
If
you look at the chart, Block Island recycles more than half a ton for every
person who lives on the island, which is a rate that is ten times higher than Charlestown.
Just
to be clear, based on the state’s numbers, Charlestown residents are credited
with recycling 0.05 tons of their waste and that amounts to only one hundred
pounds.
All
of the towns with populations near to or less than Charlestown’s recycle more
waste per person than Charlestown. There is little point in expanding the
analysis to include other towns, such as those with slightly higher
populations. Every city and town recycled more than Charlestown.
So
why does Charlestown suck so badly at recycling, despite claims by its
leadership that we’re such an environmentally conscious community?
I
believe the biggest factor is that same leadership, held by the CCA Party for the
past six years. They have an incredibly
narrow definition of environmentalism.
I used to think the CCA Party was largely just about obtaining more open space, but even that is called to question due to the CCA Party’s jihad against the Water Resource Board’s effort to secure Charlestown open space to protect water resources.
I used to think the CCA Party was largely just about obtaining more open space, but even that is called to question due to the CCA Party’s jihad against the Water Resource Board’s effort to secure Charlestown open space to protect water resources.
Now
that the devotion of the CCA Party to open space is called into question, I
guess they define environmentalism as opposition to anything that any of its
members don’t like (e.g. aquaculture, green energy). Maybe they only believe in
bicycles.
When
former Town Administrator Bill DiLibero flagged Charlestown’s poor recycling
performance and his ideas for boosting recycling, the CCA Party majority displays
complete disinterest. Under new Town Administrator Mark Stankiewicz,
Charlestown ended collection of electronic waste.
Stankiewicz banned the Charlestown Community Garden from collecting electronic waste at its 2013 Harvest Festival in Ninigret Park saying that activity competed with Charlestown’s own electronic waste collection – which then ended only a few months later.
Stankiewicz banned the Charlestown Community Garden from collecting electronic waste at its 2013 Harvest Festival in Ninigret Park saying that activity competed with Charlestown’s own electronic waste collection – which then ended only a few months later.
We
make it hard for residents, especially part-time residents, to use the transfer
station (click
here for Charlestown’s rules, if you think I’m making this up). Even after
our storm disasters created tons of rubble, the ever-shifting
set of rules confused residents who thought the town was going to help them
get rid of all the tree damage but then discovered the hoops the town made them jump through.
Playing
with the statistics to try to produce a better outcome does not change the
bottom line. Charlestown gets the smallest amount of revenue for its recyclables
of any RI municipality and our total effort is pathetic. And our town leaders
don’t seem to care.