FORMING THE RECYCLING HABIT: CAPE GIRARDEANS EMBRACE CITYWIDE RECYCLING

The long row of carefully labeled, green metal bins sits silent on a Saturday morning, save the occasional rustle of folded newspaper and assorted cereal boxes.

The unusual quiet in the city's drive-in recycling building lasts an entire two minutes.

The Rigdons roar through in their pickup, passing all the aluminum cans and glass bottles and the like, stopping at the compost area just outside the center's north wall. The couple staggers under the weight of a huge bucket of sod but make it to the proper bin.

"I make three trips a week here," says Betsy Rigdon, 50, almost gushing. "It's wonderful! We moved here from Kansas City, but Cape recycles so many more products."

The pace continues, car after car, 82 in all before the gates close at noon. And it will be much the same every Saturday until summer hours end in the fall.

The League of Women Voters cajoled the city into its first curbside recycling pilot program in one subdivision 11 years ago. And the city set up its first drop-off recycling center and took the curbside program citywide nearly 10 years ago.

Since then, Cape Girardeau residents have embraced recycling, which costs the city $662,000 a year. They say they participate for various reasons many because a limit on trash pickup enacted in 1996 forced them into it. Nevertheless, 45 percent recycle in some fashion.

That meant 3.46 million pounds of paper, aluminum, glass and more recycled last year compared to 1.2 million pounds during the nine months the program existed in the 1991-92 fiscal year.

That figure comes without the constant barrage of media messages on the subject that locals once experienced. The advertising is more low-key these days -- flyers stuffed into bills, speeches given at schools -- but the numbers steadily have increased.

Solid waste coordinator Pam Sander said the biggest jump, from 2.5 million pounds in 1995-96 to 3.5 million in 1996-97, was due to the city starting to accept more materials, including junk mail, steel and tin.

"I think residents have developed the habit," said Sander, who has worked with the program since its beginning. "It's just part of what they do."

Humble beginnings

Glenda Quinn, the League of Women Voters member who is considered the mother of recycling in Cape Girardeau, headed the pilot program in April 1990. The league was working on a national study of the issue that grabbed her interest.

She lobbied city officials to implement curbside pickup and convinced Procter & Gamble to donate containers for one neighborhood, Woodland Hills, if the city would pick them up.

"We were told people wouldn't do it," Quinn said. "But that first morning in Woodland Hills, I drove around and almost cried at how many people had those containers out. It worked out really well, and I'm proud of Cape and what they have done."

Citywide curbside pickup followed in the fall of 1991. Quinn credits the city for a slow pace in implementing recycling, but on July 1, 1996, officials got tough, implementing a two-container limit on weekly trash pickup. Residents who put out more trash have to pay extra, but collectors accept an unlimited quantity of sorted recyclable items, which are picked up on different days than trash pickups.

And some visitors to the recycling center say that act forced them into compliance.

"I only get two bags of trash," Mark Strickland, 30, said Saturday, explaining an unwieldy cardboard box he recycled. "I'm still not in the habit totally, but we always recycle our newspapers. We have a box by the door to the garage."

In 1998, the recycling program won the Governor's Award for Pollution Prevention. Tom Tucker, executive director of the Perryville-based Southeast Missouri Solid Waste Management District, said Cape Girardeau easily is the recycling leader in the seven counties and 34 cities his organization covers.

He said the program has no problems with the Missouri Department of Natural Resources and routinely receives government grants -- most recently $7,500 for a can sorter and crusher.

"Without a doubt, they're at the top of the heap," Tucker said. "Jackson's is good, too, but they don't have the volume."

Sander said the city was careful to keep accepting the same kinds of items with the same sorting guidelines, only slowly taking more diverse items. It allowed residents to educate themselves on the process and not become frustrated by changing rules.

Not a moneymaker

Some aren't educated on one point, she concedes. They believe the recycling program is a moneymaker when, in truth, the money paid for recycled materials by dealers in St. Louis and elsewhere covers only 7.5 percent of the program's costs.

While it costs only $35.32 to dump a ton of garbage at the transfer station, it costs $60 per ton to recycle. And there's no current state mandate forcing Cape Girardeau to have such a vast recycling program, even though the state set goals for waste reduction.

Even so, it's a worthwhile effort, Sander said.

"Landfilling is cheaper right now, but what is it going to cost us in the long run?" she said. "Look at what's happening in New York, where they're putting their garbage on a barge and sending it somewhere else. We're doing this for the future of our children and grandchildren."

Still, Cape Girardeau residents throw away about seven times the material they recycle. Sander is trying to combat that figure with more education, including a booth at an Earth Day observance at Southeast Missouri State University on April 21. She will have a table on the Academic Hall terrace, handing out freebies made of recycled materials along with pamphlets on the city's program.

And on April 22, which actually is Earth Day, she will be at a nature walk along Cape La Croix Trail, doing the same thing.

THE RICE OF RECYCLING

Recyclables collected, processed and shipped for market by the city fo Cape Girardeau Public Works Department:

Fiscal year Total lbs.

1991-92 1,255,300*

1992-93 2,077,893

1993-94 1,914,310

1994-95 2,524,291

1995-96 2,514,200

1996-97 2,542,414

1997-98 3,526,349

1998-99 3,449,249

1999-00 3,468,900

*For Oct. through June

SOURCE: City of Cape Girardeau

WANT MORE?

There is no limit on the amount of recyclable materials accepted at the city's facility at 120 N. Broadview, but there are limitations on the types of items that can be recycled. For more information, call city officials at 334-9151.