RECYCLING CHUTES / MULTI-FAMILY BUILDINGS

Motion - Recycling needs to be easier to do. We must, as individuals and as a community, be responsible for ourselves and for the mess we create, but it need not all be hard to accomplish. Involvement is time consuming in a very busy world but given the opportunity, most Angelinos would do their part to minimize our impact on the planet. In addition to big solutions, we must strive to make doing the right thing more obvious and more efficient. As a City, Los Angeles is entirely too dependent on dumping our trash into landfills in the effort we call management of our municipal solid waste. For years the City has worked with local agencies, private businesses, and non-profit organizations to increase awareness and decrease the volume of solid waste that needs to be disposed of. These efforts have included pilot programs such as Recycling for Dollars that rewards residents for decreases in black bin volume and increases in blue and green bin recycling. Our Bureau of Sanitation has worked hard to increase the number of things that can be extracted from our solid waste to be reused or recycled, such as plastic grocery bags and wire hangars. Along these lines, the Bureau of Sanitation is in the process of addressing Council committees on the possibility of providing recycling service to multi-family buildings. Currently the City only provides recycling services for single family dwellings and buildings with less than five units. This program has the potential to recycle tons of un-harvested materials simply by making recycling easier. Without recycling technology, we would not know what can be recycled to begin with. Without recycle bins, many people would not separate garbage. And without recycling service, many would not drive recyclables to a center. The more the public knows how and what can be recycled and the more convenient that recycling becomes, the easier it will be to increase the publics participation in this worthy effort. THEREFORE MOVE that the Bureau of Sanitation report to the Energy and Environment Committee in 30 days on the status of the Bureaus current and proposed efforts to increase recycling throughout the City, including, but not limited to, expansive public outreach and information efforts. FURTHER MOVE that the Planning Department and Department of Building and Safety (LADBS) report to the Committee on the current requirements regarding recycling in multi-family buildings and an evaluation of the adequacy of and compliance with such requirements. FURTHER MOVE that the Bureau of Sanitation, Bureau of Engineering, LADBS, and Planning Department report to the Committee on the feasibility of and an implementation plan for requiring recycling chutes for any and all future multi-family buildings that are designed to contain trash chutes. FURTHER MOVE that the City Attorney be requested to report to the Committee on the legality, and prepare a draft ordinance if appropriate, of requiring future multi-family buildings, within the City, to contain recycling facilities / units, including recycling chutes, on their premises.