The city of Bloomington is聽preparing to enact聽a new sanitation plan to modernize the city鈥檚 waste management system, upgrading to automated trash pick-ups and introducing a single-stream recycling program. The聽city鈥檚 plan will end the current system of trash stickers, instead opting for a monthly flat rate program with three different sizes of trash receptacles that vary in size and price.
This week on Noon Edition, city officials from Bloomington and Columbus joined waste management experts to discuss the challenges cities face in聽sanitation. Bloomington鈥檚 Director of Public Works Adam Wason answered many Bloomington callers who were interested in the new plan, wanting clarification on the goals of the new program.
鈥淭here鈥檚 a key word here: modernize,鈥� he says. 鈥淲e are operating a decades-old system of sanitation where our crews are literally lifting thousands and thousands of pounds a day. And so we鈥檙e looking to modernize with a system that is automated.鈥�
Programs like this have already seen success in other cities such as Columbus where Head of Public Works Bryan Burton鈥檚 team has seen benefits from automating their sanitation system. 鈥淲e went automated in 2004. We鈥檝e got five trucks, five routes that are automated,鈥� he says. 鈥淪ince 2004 our workman鈥檚 comp injuries have really reduced drastically. The guys just operate out of the trucks. It鈥檚 one man. It went from three men on a truck to one.鈥�
State Representative and Executive Director of the Indiana Recycling Coalition Carey Hamilton was also happy that the new plan moves to a single-stream recycling system, which has shown high rates of participation nationwide.
鈥淪ingle-stream is the most convenient way to recycle,鈥� she says. 鈥淲hen you make recycling convenient, people participate more often. It鈥檚 the way that recycling has gone across the country in most communities.鈥� IU Visiting Scholar Zolt谩n Ill茅s was formerly the head of the Hungarian equivalent of the EPA and studied the new sanitation plan in Bloomington.
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