NORWALK, Conn. – Norwalk schools have two months to prove they’re serious about recycling.
If, after two months of effort, Norwalk school personnel come up with proof that there’s been a serious switch to recycling in the 19 school buildings, a move will be made to make the effort permanent and bring additional revenue to the school system, Department of Public Works Director Hal Alvord said.
The Mayor’s Energy and Environment Task Force has organized a pilot program to try recycling in the schools, said Councilman John Kydes (D-District C), the task force chairman. Alvord explained Thursday that a City Carting truck will pick up recycling materials at the schools during the first full week of the school year, which begins Sept. 8. Then the schools will go back to their usual methods of waste and recycling pickup for two months, while administrators attempt to convince everyone to recycle. After the two months, a City Carting truck will return for a week and pick up the recycling materials again so city officials can see if it collects enough material to make it worth continuing the effort.
Alvord said the Board of Education has a contract with City Carting for garbage pickup, separate from the contract the city has with City Carting, but the recycling is currently picked up through the city’s contract. If the pilot program shows that the schools can get organized to the point of making recycling remunerative, the BoE will negotiate its own contract with City Carting, Alvord said.
“If the schools really have taken this seriously and increased their separation, then, at that point, we’ll say, ‘OK, we need to modify both contracts somehow,’” Alvord said. “So the schools are interested in getting some of the revenue from the recyclables. That’s fine, I don’t have a problem with that, but right now all of the recycling is done under the city’s contract. Actually, last year we took a truck and dedicated a truck for a week and what we got from all of the schools was less than a ton.”
A ton of recycling materials sells for $17.50, Alvord said. The total take from a week’s worth of pickups last year was $16, Alvord said. Hard to divide that between 19 schools, he said.
“My point is if we want to do this seriously and get some money from it, then let’s spend some money on separation,” Alvord said. “We’ll provide whatever containers they need to do it.”
A Brien McMahon High School senior has asked for 20 blue bins and toters, he said. Those will be provided.
There was a meeting last week in Deputy Superintendent Tony Daddona’s office to discuss recycling, attended by Mayor Harry Rilling, Mickey Ferro and Gary Fanali of City Carting, BoE Buildings Coordinator George Giannitti and Daddona, Alvord said. On Wednesday, Giannitti made a presentation to school principals and assistant principals Alvord said he missed the meeting because of a miscommunication, so he couldn’t say how effective the presentation was or describe the response.
“There’s a general belief that we could separate a lot more at the schools, so our waste program managers over the last few years have worked closely with George Gianitti,” Alvord said. “… They have spent a fair amount of time going from school to school to school trying to help them set up programs. They sort of start and kind of taper off.”
Three schools have been consistently diligent with recycling, he said. The three are Brookside, Rowayton and Wolfpit elementary schools.
“The plan is let’s figure out a way to get the recycling up at the schools and separate as much as we can at the schools,” he said. “The meeting last week was how are we going to figure out how to do all of this? We’ve got contracts and all of this stuff … We’re going to do this test and see what happens.”
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