Global climate protection begins at home.
Last month the city of Summit signed international Kyoto protocols. You know, a commitment to public policies that reduce global warming and save the planet.
In typical fashion we formed an ad hoc Sustainable Community Taskforce, charged with drafting a "Green" Master plan in six months, even though various standing committees already do focus on specific elements independently.
No doubt there is some good in raising public awareness. Because the job at hand is indeed collective, not just Common Council's or City Hall staff, 21,000 people live in Summit. Mindsets are changed one household at a time.
So a PR campaign, maybe based in our schools, probably is a useful exercise.
But people really want to know what they can specifically do, like: walking to school or the train station instead of being driven; car-pooling to sports events and practice, and shutting off idling automobile engines. The kind of behavior that's impossible to legislate.
The thing we should focus on first is our solid waste stream. Not the underground sanitary sewer system, just plain old fashioned garbage.
We generate 20,000 tons of it a year. Summit stopped burning trash at our Transfer Station in 1970. Mandatory recycling today, however, removes barely 40% of our refuse. Leaving more than 12,000 tons to be hauled away annually to the county incinerator.
Elizabeth charged us $1 million in "tipping fees" last year, including a $72,000 surcharge for exceeding our tonnage quota. It behooves Summit to improve recycling procedures immediately.
We've contracted for each house to receive curbside recycling every other week from a third party vendor. Thus it's a fixed cost whether you use them or not. If everyone did separate and recycle their newspapers and plastic/glass bottles, it would help save the environment as well as our wallets.
The less our own dustmen collect from your back door each week in normal trash, the cheaper will be our municipal budget. Somehow we've got to raise our "recycle capture rate" back over 50%.
A greener climate, storm water management, energy conservation, all take a back seat to recycling practices in my book. Because trash recycling affects pocketbooks plus our quality of life.
Each of us can contribute by being conscious of the resources we consume on a daily basis. Do you part and clean up after ourselves, leaving fewer footprints.
Tom's Current Agenda
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