What do you envision Juneau’s recycling program to look like in five years?
I envision mandatory recycling of any material that has a market for the product. We as stewards of our land and air need to make every effort to conserve the resources we use. Juneau can learn lessons from many other communities that currently have comprehensive recycling programs (both voluntary and mandatory). It is not necessary to re-invent the wheel but it is imperative that the Assembly promote a program that works within for our community. Secondly, I would like to see the Assembly take an advocacy role for any business that would like to develop local uses for recycled materials.
Mandatory recycling is the biggest load of crap I’ve heard of. You want to force people to sort their garbage? How about start by alaska participating in can and bottle recycling like down south. People pay a deposit on the bottle or can, and get it back if they choose to recycle them. Taking away a persons choice to do what they wish is not a way to get my vote.
Juneau is a remote community with a big dependance on fossil fuels any way you look at. Setting aside the road issue to contemplate our dependance on barge service to deliver our groceries, fuel, and even recycle our trash, we need to focus on what can be done here and how.
The ability to take our trash to a local recycling center where they can melt it, mold it and create a product that we can use in town is the cheapest most reliable and environmentally feasible plan we can implement. And if we end up having a reserve of said product then yes we send it south for a profit on those gas-guzzling barges.
As a local carpenter I see daily the reprocussions of what I build, mainly I see the landfill just get bigger and bigger and eventually will need some contamination cleanup due to the runoff affecting lemon creek and filtering right into the bird habitat and prized hunting grounds that is the mendenhall wetlands.
With the ability to melt all that metal banding, recycle the cardboard, plastic and drywall, we would be leaps and bounds ahead of the next town. Its time to be pro-active and quit thinking it’s still the good ol’ days of Juneau where nothing we do can affects our pristine playground.