Politics of recycling

By Tony Cook

Thursday, Nov. 30, 2006 | 6:56 a.m.

The atmosphere more closely resembled that of a political war room than a meeting of the Southern Nevada Recycling Advisory Committee.

There was talk about lobbying elected officials and providing political cover. The group has even established its own lobbying arm - the legislative outreach and media relations working group.

The more politicized approach to the group's task - to develop proposals that will improve the valley's dismal recycling rate - is a reaction to the tough lesson that members learned about the politics of waste management in August.

That's when Clark County commissioners, dissatisfied with the committee's work, sent it back to the drawing board, rejecting the group's initial recommendation.

That recommendation was for a pilot program in which residents would receive once-a-week garbage pickup instead of twice a week. In exchange, the local waste hauler, Republic Services, would give residents a 65- or 96-gallon can for recyclables, which would be picked up weekly instead of every other week.

Many residents, however, expressed concerns about the stench from garbage rotting in sweltering garages or under the desert's summer sun. Others thought the deal might result in a windfall profit for Republic, a company that has given large political donations to local officials and has received several unusual contract extensions with the county and Las Vegas.

Those sentiments played a large role in the County Commission's decision to squelch the committee's proposal, even though the program would have been a test run.

Committee members say they were stunned at the upheaval their recommendation caused, and they blamed the media's negative coverage.

"Three front-page, above-the-fold stories!" member Elizabeth Nelson said at the committee's meeting Tuesday.

"We misjudged what kind of reaction we would get," added committee Chairman Dennis Campbell, director of environmental health for the Southern Nevada Health District, which formed the advisory committee along with the County Commission.

Members also say they felt commissioners lacked perspective on what the committee was trying to accomplish.

During the August meeting, committee member Tara Pike, director of UNLV's recycling program, shook her head in frustration as Commissioner Lynette Boggs McDonald told committee members that they should consider incentives like those in other states, where residents can get a nickel for turning in a glass bottle.

"I was sitting back there thinking, 'We need to educate these people,' " Pike said. Such an incentive would require action from the Legislature and would stand only a small chance of passing, she added.

But the committee is not licking its wounds.

Instead, members are looking for a more politically palatable recommendation, recrafting their image and planning a grass-roots campaign and lobbying efforts to sell a revised plan.

After the August debacle, Republic Services representatives left the committee, although they still attend meetings in an advisory role.

"Basically, we wanted to make sure anything we came up with did not appear to be Republic Services-driven," Campbell said.

At the meeting Tuesday, the committee decided to look into three pilot programs. They would include the group's original proposal, plus two others that would implement single-stream recycling - instead of the three bins with which residents must currently grapple - once or twice a week.

That recommendation might be more politically acceptable than the initial one, but committee members are taking no chances.

They plan to launch the equivalent of a grass-roots political campaign to convince the public that testing several expanded curbside-recycling programs is a good idea.

They'll start by meeting with homeowners associations in December and January to educate residents about what the committee is trying to do and to get some of them to volunteer to participate in the pilot programs.

After those meetings, the committee plans to get onto the agendas of local town advisory boards, again to make a pitch for the pilot programs and to solicit feedback.

Last time around the committee held only three public meetings.

"It's better to start a little bit lower, at the grass-roots," Campbell said.

That wasn't the only comment at Tuesday's meeting that sounded fit for a political campaign strategy session.

The committee talked, for instance, about ways to spin the information it will be presenting.

One member suggested the presentation include the potential financial impact. Although the committee believes its initial plan would have been cost-neutral, the two new programs being considered would likely require a fee if implemented because of increased service and capital costs.

Another member suggested an alternative to the term "financial impact" - "pros and cons."

Then a third member piped up.

"I would say 'benefits,' " he said. He then suggested a hard-hitting public service announcement.

"Show stuff being dumped in the garbage and then show trees getting cut down," he said.

Then there's the planned lobbying effort.

Two committee members from its legislative outreach and media relations arm - Pike and conservationist Scott Rutledge - plan to lobby individual county commissioners in February, in part to get a sense of whether the committee is heading in the right direction.

They will be armed with statistics. Clark County's overall recycling rate is only 18 percent and curbside residential recycling is a mere 2 percent, officials say.

The group also is looking - at the county's request - at ways to increase commercial and apartment recycling.

One option might be a pilot program at certain office complexes. Apartments are tougher because of regulations regarding dumpsters and how they are enclosed. But committee member Brenda Lovato, a local property manager, said apartments could begin small by providing bins for paper recycling in apartment mailrooms.

The committee's outreach campaign will end in May, when members plan to present their new recommendations to commissioners.

"We've got to pack the place with people who are positive about it," Lovato said.

If that happens, committee members realize, there's a better chance that their new plan, unlike the first one, won't be trashed.