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Photo Credit: Lawrence R. Melamed/James Madison High School
Borough President Adams helped students at James Madison High School
build Brooklyn’s longest chain of plastic bags on record, wrapping it around
the perimeter of their Madison campus, as part of a class project that resulted
in a student-led effort to advance plastics recycling.
Don’t Waste It!
Brooklyn’s generating a lot of trash,
but where does it go and how can we recycle
more of it so that we don’t waste our
waste? Sixty-eight percent of residents
across the city throw away trash that
can be recycled or composted as organic
waste, according to statistical information
compiled by the New York City Department
of Sanitation (DSNY). Yet, only about 52
percent of paper and 45 percent of glass,
metal, and plastic that are thrown away
are recycled.
The average family in the city also
throws out about 650 pounds of organic
waste that can be reused in the community
every year.
“We have two mothers, one who gave
birth to us and one who gave birth to our
planet; we have a responsibility to care
for both of them,” said Borough President
Adams. “It’s easier than ever to integrate
habits into our daily routines that reduce
waste at home and at work, especially recycling
and composting.”
Borough President Adams has committed
his administration to raising
awareness of the importance of composting
organics and recycling through a variety
of initiatives at Brooklyn Borough Hall
and across the borough. His office has
collected more than 300 pounds of organics
waste — mostly from his own culinary
creations in the kitchen — that have been
composted by the Brooklyn Borough Hall
Greenmarket operated by GrowNYC. Borough
President Adams also works with
GrowNYC and DSNY in holding a free annual
“Stop ‘N’ Swap” event at Columbus
Park in Downtown Brooklyn during Earth
Week, which provides the public with an
opportunity to bring clean, portable, and
reusable items for drop-off, exchange,
or pick-up. He has also sought to expand
composting into the borough’s burgeoning
craft beverage industry through the recycling
of spent grains, which would reduce
a significant financial expense on these
small businesses.
In addition to individual recycling
practices at home or in the workplace,
Brooklyn residents have the opportunity to
make their voice heard on what happens
with waste management on a legislative
and policy level by joining the borough’s
Solid Waste Advisory Board (SWAB), which
advises DSNY and other City agencies on
waste management, recycling, and sustainability
issues. The board, which meets
periodically at Brooklyn Borough Hall, is
chaired by Park Slope resident and sustainability
advocate Sarah Bloomquist.
“Microhauling a process by which
waste is processed locally is a major issue,
particularly with regard to keeping
waste management and recycling in the
community; it’s a way that we can reduce
truck mileage and keep organics out of
the landfills,” said Bloomquist. “A third of
generated waste is organic, such as food
scraps, plants, and soil, so we should be
figuring out how to process and use it locally
for everyone’s benefit in places like
community gardens.”
Incorporating composting into our
daily lives starts with developing good
habits at an early age. In an April 2016
report, Borough President Adams called
for compensating the sustainability coordinators
that are mandated at each public
school, which would expand the success
of recycling efforts as well as improve
educational outcomes. The City has recently
allocated $15 million for biodegradable
cutlery to more than 1,250 City
public schools. Additionally, 700 schools
participate in DSNY’s Organics Collection
program, which transports compost to
farmers and landscapers outside the five
boroughs; that program has been rolled
out more broadly to residential buildings
in more than half of Brooklyn, and is expected
to be fully citywide by the end of
2018.
For more information on recyclable
items, as well as recycling locations,
please visit nyc.gov/recycling.