Valley’s trash system faces changes

Stephen Curran

Monday, April 18, 2005 | 11:07 a.m.

A host of changes to the way Southern Nevadans sort and throw out their trash may be in the works, the president of the area's trash collector said.

But to make way for a stepped-up recycling program, considered a top priority by county officials and a corporate-sponsored focus group, area residents may have to make due with wheeling a larger trash container to the curb once a week, Bob Coyle, area president of Republic Services of Southern Nevada, said.

The company, under contract to collect the county's trash until 2035, plans to seek approval from the Clark County Commission to move ahead with a pilot study of the changes, he said. That process is six weeks to two months away, he said.

It would cost the same -- $11.33 a month -- but would use the pickup day previously used for garbage to haul glass, newspaper and metal objects for recycling, he said. Under the proposal, residents would see garbage picked up once a week and recyclables picked up once a week.

Roma Haynes, who as the county's franchise services coordinator oversees the company's contract, said she supported Republic's plan to study a seemingly more convenient recycling program but that it would potentially require an amendment or ordinance releasing the Florida-based company from its contractual obligation to pick up garbage twice a week.

"Any kind of test that Republic wants to try, I'm sure our board would be open to considering," she said. "... It would be something that would enhance our recycling for sure here in Southern Nevada."

Valley residents currently use three separate, 12-gallon crates to sort their recyclable material. A new program would include a new, 95-gallon container for it. At $100 apiece, the new containers would cost the company roughly $40 million for the 400,000 homes Republic serves, Coyle said.

Customers living in single-family homes also would receive at no cost a larger container for their trash. Coyle said the company had the idea tested on focus groups and participants were mostly receptive to the proposal. The larger containers are now available for about a $3.50-a-month surcharge to the roughly 10 percent of customers who use them, Coyle said.

"Their thoughts were if we provided the carts at no additional charge they would have more than enough capacity in the 95-gallon carts," he said of the focus groups' findings. "... Most said they would like to recycle more so it would make it more convenient."

Homeowner Kirsti Cardon said she supports increased recycling but isn't keen on the prospect of having trash piling up longer in her garage while awaiting once-a-week collection.

Cardon, who lives in the northwest valley with her husband and their dog, said her household produces enough trash to justify two garbage pickups. As it stands, Cardon said, she is often too busy to carefully sort her recyclable material, so she likes the proposed recycling change.

"I could accommodate that," Cardon said of the possible changes. "I wouldn't object to that. If your family has five kids and you have a lot of stuff, though, I don't know ... If it was only once a week I would probably take the loads to a Dumpster somewhere."

Clark County has long fallen short of a statewide goal set in 1991 to recycle 25 percent of its trash by 1996. By late last year, Nevada had barely broken the 10 percent mark, compared to 30 percent nationwide.

Coyle's proposal would not immediately include recycling at the area's many apartment complexes, which currently do not provide recycling. Efforts to introduce recycling to those complexes has long proven difficult as large Dumpsters intended for recyclable materials often become trash cans, Haynes said.

Marion Edison, who lives in a condominium in the Silver Pines development in Summerlin, saw that firsthand. Silver Pines used to offer a communal trash bin for recyclables, but so much non-recyclable trash was put in it that it to be removed, she said.

Edison said she and her neighbors in the 290-condominium development would be reluctant to support a return to that system.

"We could never do that," she said. "We only get collected two days a week anyways. I don't think it would work in a condo complex."

Provided commissioners approve Coyle's plan to try a pilot program using the proposed changes, the company would have to find a homeowners association or neighborhood willing to let itself be the project's guinea pig, officials said.

But the leader of one of the nation's largest homeowners associations was hardly sold on the idea. As president of the Summerlin North Community Association, Hal Bloch represents more than 15,000 homes and oversees a budget just a few million dollars less than Boulder City.

The issue would likely be voted on by one of the more than 100 separate neighborhood boards that comprise Summerlin North, not by the entire association executive board, which Bloch heads, he said.

If the matter came before his neighborhood board, Bloch said he would personally vote against it.

"I think it's something the homeowners would be very much against," he said. "I think it's an idea that definitely favors Republic and doesn't favor the homeowners."

Homeowners don't want to have garbage stinking up their garages for a week before it is collected, particularly during the summer, he said.