SAVE RECYCLING

BY REPRESENTATIVE SPENCER BLACK

    Wisconsin's recycling program has been a big success.   More than 40% of the waste that would have gone to landfills is now being recycled.  Over 2000 new jobs have been created.  Tens of millions of dollars worth of natural resources that otherwise would have been dumped into the ground are now being productively reused.  Plans for many new landfills have been shelved.  More than 95% of Wisconsin citizens are participating in our recycling efforts.

    Last week, the Legislature's Joint Finance Committee voted to throw our nationally recognized and award winning recycling program in the trash can.

    The Joint Finance Committee voted to end the requirement for statewide recycling in 1999 and to end all assistance to local recycling programs in 2000.  While some communities may continue to recycle on their own, the reality is that with no statewide recycling requirement and with no financial assistance, recycling efforts will be cut back dramatically or eliminated altogether.

    In the hectic last days of budget deliberations, lobbyists often try to take advantage and try to slip special favors into the budget.  When we passed the recycling bill in 1990, the press called it the most heavily lobbied bill ever in Wisconsin political history.  Landfill and plastic industry lobbyists fought hard against passage of the recycling bill. They didn't get their way back then, but they have been waiting in the weeds ever since for the chance to kill recycling.

    The landfill lobby has finally got its way.  Now, new landfills will have to be built in communities across the state to deal with the waste that otherwise would have been recycled.

    The motion to kill recycling was pushed by Republican Senator Mary Panzer.  Senator Panzer claims recycling should be strictly a local decision.  However, recycling has gained such widespread citizen cooperation precisely because the public feels that everyone is cooperating.  They rightly feel that their recycling efforts  should not be canceled out by a neighboring community that refuses to pitch in. Also, having a statewide recycling requirement has created a statewide infrastructure that provides facilities for the processing and reuse of waste.  Recycling works because we're all working together.

    Ironically, while the Joint Finance Committee voted to kill the recycling requirement, they left in place the law that allows landfill companies to override local laws in order to put landfills where they want.  Landfill lobbyists say this is necessary because landfills are not strictly local, but regional.  Regional, engineered landfills are better for the environment because they provide greater protection for our drinking water.  However, it makes no sense to make landfilling of waste a policy governed by state law, but make recycling a strictly local decision.

    The Joint Finance Committee action would also eliminate any possibility that Wisconsin can control out of state waste.  With landfills closing throughout Northern Illinois and the Chicago area, industry publications predict that Wisconsin will see a flood of garbage coming our way.  Now we will have no way to restrict the dumping of nonrecycled out of state trash in Wisconsin.

    There is still a chance to save recycling.  The public supports recycling.  I have heard from many people who are astounded and outraged by the Joint Finance vote to kill recycling. The budget will next be considered by the Senate.  Hopefully, they will say no to the lobbyists for the landfill industry and keep our award winning recycling program in place.

Representative Spencer Black is the Assembly author of the Wisconsin Recycling Law.
He can be reached via email at Rep.Black@legis.state.wi.us