RESIDENTS SHOULD GIVE CITY RECYCLING A CHANCE

Come Tuesday, Cape Girardeau will move into a new era of recycling when the city begins a voluntary curbside program. One of the two trash collections each week will now be devoted exclusively to recyclable goods.

The change has drawn criticism from some city residents, who complain solid waste service will be cut in half.

We suggest that residents give this recycling program a chance, and exhibit a measure of patience with the city. It's difficult for all of us to adjust to change, but in this venture the city has very little choice.

By 1998, cities must reduce by 40 percent the amount of solid wastes going into landfills. That mandate offers few options to governments: Either the number of people served has to drop dramatically or the amount of trash they discard must be slashed. Recycling addresses the latter.

Yes, city solid waste service will be reduced to once a week without a reduction in costs. But let's face facts: Recycling is expensive. The service will cost the city more in terms of manpower, equipment and handling. Trash service will remain twice weekly.

There's no way the city can offer a price reduction when recycling will actually increase the costs. City officials determined the only way to start a recycling program without an increase in trash fees was to make it part of the regular solid waste collection program.

The new service will be inconvenient at first due to the change in pickup and routes. We will all have to think more about our trash both what we buy and what we throw away.

The recycling plan is really quite simple. The city will accept five types of materials: clean, dry newspapers tied into bundles or bagged; corrugated cardboard boxes flattened into bundles; rinsed glass with the lids or caps removed; any plastic container with a recycling logo on the bottom that has been rinsed, with lids and caps removed; and all types of aluminum. One day a week on each trash route, the city will accept only recyclables. The other pickup day on each route, the city will collect the regular trash.

The pickup schedule depends on where you live in town, and a map outlining the four areas appears elsewhere in today's newspaper along with stories explaining the new recycling program.

Whether you want to recycle or not remains voluntary at this point. In the future, we may not have a choice. Our landfills are filling up. If we have the choice of recycling our trash or living next to a new landfill, most people would chose the former. These are just the kind of choices we all may have to make in the near future.

A 40 percent reduction in the amount of trash going into landfills won't happen overnight. Recycling will play a major role in accomplishing this goal. Like it or not, recycling is here to stay.

The city may find after a few months that adjustments need to be made. For example, the city may find that recycling is needed every other week. We need to give this some time to work out the kinks. Patience will go a long way toward the success of this new program.