On March 10, the City Council Public Works, Sanitation and Environment Committee convened to talk trash (among other topics). Committee Chair Councilmember Jason Hughes acknowledged that there were several comment cards submitted that were related to an EPA grant, but as the City was not operating the grant, the comments would not be read into the record (they later did not show up in a public records request, presumably for the same reason). You may be wondering, what grant? In 2023, the City was awarded a grant from the EPA that, combined with funds from a nonprofit called The Recycling Partnership, would have funded “universal access to curbside recycling” without using money from the general fund. However, the future of this grant is now in jeopardy. Councilmember JP Morrell’s legislative director Julia Zuckerman claimed that the City’s budget crisis means that the City could not implement the grant. But advocates dispute this claim, saying the cost of the program was completely covered by the grant. Advocates say the move would not increase the cost of sanitation contracts with the City, but it would increase costs for the businesses that hold those contracts, such as IV Waste, which has been a vocal opponent of recycling expansion. IV Waste’s owner, Sidney Torres, has donated to several sitting councilmembers’ campaign funds. Incidentally, Kenner Mayor Mike Glaser called Sidney Torres “a menace,” and says that IV Waste overcharged Kenner by more than $1.5 million annually, with the bulk of the overages coming from recycling charges. Torres promptly filed suit against the Mayor for defamation, and also sued Fox 8 for their reporting series which included allegations of “bid-rigging and overbilling.” In more trash news, Mayor Helena Moreno also has suggested increasing the sanitation fee charged to residents, despite the well-known fact that the fee residents pay has remained the same while pickup has been reduced from twice a week to merely once a week since 2021. She then suggested potentially eliminating residential recycling, which would also save money for the waste contractors. As of press time, the City stands to lose over $5 million in grant funding for a basic service, while cutting a service and potentially increasing fees to residents. The following are a selection of comments submitted in-person for the Council. They have been lightly edited for clarity and length.
I’m a citizen of the Seventh Ward, and I’m here to ask that the City continue supporting residential curbside recycling and expand access to recycling by transitioning to an opt-out program. We are a city plagued by garbage. I cannot take a stroll around my block or even City Park without encountering litter. What disturbs me more than the eyesore of the piles of litter is knowing that there are tons and tons more of it sitting in landfills that could have been reused or recycled, tons of usable material that instead of polluting our land, water, and bodies, could have been utilized, sparing us from additional extraction of the Earth, of which we only have one! We have funds from the EPA that are not being—[mic cut]1Annie M. (Common Ground Relief)
I really want to ask—we [Office of Sustainability] submitted a [recycling] cart contract in September to the former administration and you guys swept it under the rug for six months. This is related to the EPA SWIFR [Solid Waste Infrastructure for Recycling] program for curbside recycling. You cannot sweep this under the rug anymore. As far as capacity is concerned, there is an offer on the table for a MRF [Material Recycling Facility] in New Orleans East that is on the table since 2022 but a failure to rezone that land has been keeping us a throwaway city for the last three years. We’re spending $55 million on contracts, $6.1 million of that is lost to a service not provided because 42% of our houses have recycling carts. 58% are paying for that service but do not have access, the majority of whom are working class, Black New Orleanians. To reverse that disparity, we have the funds to provide access, but you guys, all of you are complicit and [are] withholding federal funding to provide universal access for people! It is on you guys! You have a contract in front of you that you can approve!2Chris L. (formerly Office of Sustainability)
I’ve spent over 1,000 hours picking up and sorting waste and recycling at a local park, as well as working on Compost NOW, which is a compost organization within the city. We absolutely have to look at the situation. There’s money on the table. We need to help hold all the teams accountable. And Louisiana is not in a talent drain. There are talented people who are making plans. They’re talented people who have been speaking up for their communities, whether it’s the East or rural parts of Louisiana. There are lots of people working on this, and we have to work together. I don’t know why people are acting like there’s not money on the table or grants that we might lose. The waste can be sorted. The waste can be used for other things, and we’re killing ourselves when we’re not doing it, so we’ve got to get with— [mic cut]3Lily C.
I’m really upset about the sanitation issue, and I’m really upset about the recycling issue, and the composting issue, because it’s an issue of the circular economy. We’re not investing in our youth. We’re not investing in our economy, or even taking advantage of the job creation that we could generate simply from properly recycling and generating products through the circular economy.4Keeley L.
To follow up on this issue, you can email your City councilmembers. To submit a public comment, follow instructions at council.nola.gov. Interested in reading all comments after a meeting? You can email your councilmember or file a public records request.
illustration by Sadie Wiese
