More trash rants from me.

So today is supposed to be recyle day and I spent at least an hour yesterday cutting the cardboard boxes I used for moving in. I ended up having 10 paperbags full of recycled paper materials.

This morning, the recycle truck just picked up 2 of the 10 paperbags, and when I called the Streets department, they said crew chiefs will inspect the street and the truck would go back. Well what happened was the regular truck came back instead of the recycling truck and picked up the recycle materials together with the regular trash.

So, is recycling really being enforced in the city? I noticed all of my neighbors are just mixing recyclable materials with their regular trash which might explain why the regular garbage crew just loaded up all the trash they see on the sidewalks, including recyclables.

The answer to your question about enforcement is "yes" and "no".

There are several factors in your situation. First is that it seems your trash crew is not well informed or particularly caring about recycling. It's important for both the recycling and the trash crews to know what is and isn't recyclable and to abide- but since there are different programs running simultaneously in Philly right now, it may be hard for them to always remember. In N Philly you have to separate all your recyclables (metals and glass in one container, paper in another and no plastics) while three other areas of the city have single stream, which allows you to put all recyclables, including plastics, in one container.

Secondly, crews often skip through areas where they don't see regular participaton. If you see that your neighbors aren't recycling, they may be less diligent about coming down your street and collecting. Encouraging your neighbors to participate could help.

As for actual enforcement- there are SWEEP officers that do go around and check to see if people are recycling and are able to issue $25 tickets to those caught with recylables in their trash. But there are only 30something officers for the whole city, so it's hard for them to be everywhere.

You did the right thing by reporting the incident- and should continue to do so if it happens again.