I came home the other night and discovered the Mother of All Recycling Containers at the end of my driveway. Yes, I live close to the loony enclave known as Columbia, but this is a Howard Countywide insanity.
I’m really not kidding about the size of this container. It’s allegedly 64 gallons and emblazoned with the eco-sentiment: “All Together Now,” like the Beatles were doing the soundtrack to my trash. Go to the store and pick up a gallon jug of milk or water. Now envision something blue and big enough to hold 64 of those deposited at your home without your request — with your own tax dollars. It’s not New York Giant blue, but it’s like having a lineman in your backyard.
The container is large enough that it doesn’t fit in the shed where I keep my trash can. I lumbered up my drive, wondering whether I needed a personal trailer hitch to operate my new mandatory recycling bin. This is County Exec Ken Ulman’s idea of the greening of Maryland, by forcing each of us to struggle with enormous blue recycling bins, though the County Council signed off on it as well.
Maybe we can call the young Exec Mr. Has Bin or Kid Kan, since he’s the spirit behind the nearly $3 million program. You read that right. At a time of tight budgets and projected shortfalls, Howard is trying to green its little bit of America by going Big Blue. Part of that cost includes a nifty little radio-frequency identification tag that lets the county track which home has the bin and how often you recycle. Some petty gray-suited functionary is now going to assess my antisocial recycling opposition. It’s an intersection between Big Brother and garbage, not that there’s much difference between the two.
Unfortunately, the county views the plan as a success, which means some well-meaning autocrat, I mean bureaucrat, will probably inflict it on you sometime soon. The pilot program reportedly included 5,000 containers and “recycling tonnages increased by 25 percent and trash decreased by 11 percent,” according to Kevin Enright, director of the county’s Office of Public Information.
That sounds like more than it is. It adds up to just under $40,000 for both the increased recycling material and decrease in trash.
That’s pretty basic math — just $8 a home. We currently pay $225 for sanitation services, but that price is expected to spike.
I won’t automatically fault the county’s math on this one. But it would be easy to change that tally slightly and have this become a money loser. How much of Kid Kan’s time did this cost? How about other county officers, including the public information officer? That all adds up, though I’m confident the county won’t do so.
At least Howard lets you call them and rid yourself of the Big Blue Behemoth. And I’ll certainly be calling, but I can’t help but wonder one key thing. Is it recyclable?
Dan Gainor can be seen each week on Friday afternoons on the new Fox Business Network. He is T. Boone Pickens Fellow at the Media Research Center’s Business & Media Institute, a career journalist and media commentator. He can be reached at [email protected].
