On Tuesday, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors voted to approve a proposal "for the most comprehensive mandatory composting and recycling law in the country." Essentially, if you live in San Francisco, you better learn to separate your recyclables, from your kitchen scraps, from your landfill-bound waste — otherwise you could be looking at some steep fines...
We think mandatory recycling/composting makes good environmental sense, but we're wondering if the enforcement will be problematic?
According to an article in the San Francisco Chronicle, the fines will be implemented slowly, so that people (especially tenants and owners of multi-family buildings) can get used to composting, etc.
What are your thoughts on mandatory recycling?
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Mandatory recycling? Sure. Mandatory composting? I don't know. Implementing both at once seems like it requires an awful lot of education.
Don't get me wrong, I'm pro-composting. But I don't know how successful this is going to be.
view How Green Is My Valley's profile
I live in San Francisco. I am not extremely happy about this new law. I wonder how well this law can be enforced.
view vintagekttn's profile
I hope the law can be enforced, I know ignorance is no excuse, but hopefully with San Francisco being so forward thinking they will have some great educational material for their citizens to learn about what to do, and how to do it. Hopefully this can become a model that all cities will follow
view piffdos's profile
Most SF homeowners already doing this. It's dead simple. You don't do the composting yourself - you just put your compostables in the green bin and it gets picked up on trash day. The only extra work is putting out the 3 bins. If you live in an apartment building you won't even have to do that, just keep things in separate bags and throw them in the correct bin. And for people in houses, it's actually a convenience to have your garden waste hauled away for free every week.
view deniseb's profile
It's no big deal. I live in Germany and we have four bins - paper, plastics/metals, compost, and everything else. I also have a box for bottles, and tubs for batteries and old electronics. So in total seven receptacles, five of which are in daily use.
You know, what? We cope.
Adam
view Adam Lawrence's profile
i agree with adam. also, i think the only way to get people to change their ways is to hit them in the wallet. cynical? maybe, but also realistic, methinks.
it's like anti-idling laws: perhaps difficult to enforce, but the media attention routinely given over to such measures is enough to make people make the change.
and, most importantly, if we continue bitching about the slightest inconvenience, nothing will ever change on this planet.
view the polish chick's profile