RECYCLE NOW SO LANDFILLS GET DUMPED.

Byline: Greig Smith  Local View

IF Los Angeles aspires to be a world-class city in the 21st century, we must put an end to the 4,000-year-old practice of digging a hole in the ground and throwing our trash into it. Especially, if that hole is in someone's back yard, as is the case with the Sunshine Canyon Landfill.

Being the city's leading advocate of putting an end to landfilling, I'm often asked about the alternatives and the city's plans for the future. It has become obvious to me that most Angelenos are unfamiliar with the many things that the city of Los Angeles is actively doing as it pursues the mayor's executive order to stop dumping in the Sunshine Canyon Landfill after 2006. This is a multipronged effort, some of which is already in process and the remainder of which will roll out in stages over the next few years. Eventually, our dependence on landfilling will be eliminated.

The city already has several operational pilot programs to increase recycling and diversion. Though their waste stream is not handled by the city's Bureau of Sanitation, but by private haulers, businesses and apartments generate far more waste than single-family residents and plans to put an end to landfilling must include them.

The most ambitious program is our Multifamily Recycling Pilot, which will roll out in a few months to apartment buildings and condominiums. It will encompass 100,000 units, using five separate contractors, testing a multitude of approaches in order to evaluate best practices for achieving maximum participation citywide.

Most business owners probably don't know that the city provides free technical assistance to evaluate their waste stream in order to cut their trash bill, increase recycling and even generate revenue. Additionally, we have a Recycling Market Development Zone program that has been established to attract businesses that will purchase byproducts and recyclables from other businesses in order to create new, saleable products. One business's trash is often another's commodity.

Los Angeles also funds L.A. Shares, a program in which nonprofits and schools can register for online auctions of necessary items provided by businesses that no longer have a need for them.

Another pilot program targets business sectors that produce a waste stream rich in dry cardboard content, such as strip malls. This waste will be taken to a materials-recovery facility where the recyclables are removed. The goal for the pilot is a self-sustaining, revenue-producing program.

Food waste generated by restaurants is being collected in a smaller pilot to be converted to compost. The DWP has contracted with Bioconverter LLC, which will provide the utility with a renewable energy source, all generated from waste.

Los Angeles has recently enlisted a specialist to evaluate the feasibility and cost-benefit value of various alternative technologies, which will take our waste and convert it into fuels, energy or saleable products. The next phase will be to introduce residents to these technologies, through our neighborhood councils, in coming months.

I co-authored legislation to identify high-profile building projects where the LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) standards could be applied. This establishes guidelines for use of recycled building materials and construction and demolition waste.

I also authored legislation that requires the city to maintain a database of (noncity) government facilities located within our boundaries, to track recycling efforts, and provide assistance. Another ordinance is being drafted requiring recycling from all construction and demolition projects that utilize city funding or grants.

The city requires that private waste haulers offer recycling to their customers. In order to encourage compliance, we offer substantial rebates against their city franchise fee - $10 for every ton of construction and demolition waste and $25 for every ton of nonsource-separated municipal solid waste recycled.

I am optimistic that our dependence on landfilling can and will be eliminated. As the city gets more and more efficient at diverting, reducing, recycling and converting our waste stream, it will be necessary to landfill only a small residual amount and that certainly won't be in our back yards - or anyone else's.