To the Editor:

The City of Albany held its fourth and final meeting on the “Future of Solid Waste in Albany” at Hackett Middle School on June 20, one day after the public-comment period on its proposal ended.

Long-time city employees Joe Giebelhaus and Frank Zeoli were joined by Hans Arnold, a consultant and former director of the Oneida-Herkimer Solid Waste Authority. The city’s presentation was focused on plans it is considering to:

— 1. Mechanize the collection of household wastes and recyclables;

— 2. Eventually implement a pay-as-you-throw (payt) collection and fee system for city residents; and

— 3. Construct a transfer station.

Mr. Zeoli said “no one” in Albany puts lids on their blue recycling bins, an incorrect statement that leads me to wonder if he ever observes recyclables being picked up.

Mr. Giebelhaus said collection practices in Albany are similar to what they were in 1974 when curbside collection began and the city is eager to mechanize as much as possible the collection of trash and recyclables to reduce workers’ compensation costs and worker injuries.

Residents have ideas to contribute. We see city workers collect the trash and recyclables. With better training and supervision, worker injuries might be reduced.

For example, workers might be instructed to not pick up alone what may be or are heavy loads and to slow down when working. With an effective education campaign encouraging waste reduction, there might be much less stuff to pick up. Residents could also be required to schedule for heavy loads to be picked up.

My point is the public can offer to the city a variety of options to cut workplace injuries, workers’ compensation claims, and improving the collection system. Does the city want to hear from us? Albany has wasted many years when it could have been making substantial improvements in its solid waste management programs.

During the meeting, a man asked if the city had ever performed any analysis of what the avoided costs would be if all the items that are supposed to be recycled were recycled. The city has apparently never done such an analysis.

In response to a question about if the city has conducted any greenhouse-gas analysis of the city’s solid-waste program, Mr. Giebelhaus said “no” because the city has not yet decided on exactly what improvements it will make in the curbside collection system or which of the many payt options it will implement.

A greenhouse-gas inventory of the city’s entire existing solid-waste program should be a top priority.  It would help inform the coming decisions about collection system changes and payt.

The city has much it could learn from its residents. Albany would benefit from a true collaborative planning process instead of the usual top-down approach. Solid waste management is a many-faceted problem but also an opportunity to set high standards and high diversion (from landfill) rates.

With meaningful public participation, the city could avoid making giant errors as it has done in the past. These include siting a landfill in a pine barrens and expanding it many times, allowing a filthy trash incinerator to operate in the downtown for 12 years, and spending $5 million for a parcel in Coeymans where the city foolishly hoped to site an alternative to the Rapp Road landfill but could not because the Coeymans site has large tracts of wetlands.  

What is needed in Albany is an ongoing series of meetings between city officials and the public to discuss the city’s entire solid waste-management program and various suggestions residents have to improve it.

Among the issues that should be included in such a dialogue are zero waste, waste reduction, reuse, recycling, household hazardous wastes, a resources recovery park, education, enforcement, justice issues, economics, workers’ compensation, which components of the system would be public and which private, inter-municipal agreements, the institutional infrastructure, avoided costs, maintaining unionized jobs for city workers, transparency in decision-making, the looming Rapp Road landfill closure and “restoration,” public health, climate change, flexibility, and public participation.

Tom Ellis

Albany

Editor’s note: The author read part of the June 15, 2017 Enterprise editorial, “Our county should get to the root of the problem of overflowing landfills by legislating for zero waste,” during the public comment portion of the June 19 Albany Common Council meeting while he discussed solid-waste planning matters.