St. Pete Mayor Rick Kriseman is updating residents on the contentious rollout of universal curbside recycling in his weekly SUNblast newsletter sent to subscribing residents.
Kriseman said the numbers show participation rates are exceeding early expectations. An inquiry into those numbers was not immediately answered. However, Kriseman explained the sanitation department is calculating participation by comparing 10 selected areas throughout the city by looking at the number of bins tipped verses the number of possible participants.
During the first week of recycling the city estimated there was a 54 percent participation rate.
There’s also some potential good news for residents in traditional neighborhoods where trash is collected from alleys, not the curb. Many residents in those neighborhoods like Historic Old Northeast and Historic Kenwood have been pushing the city to incorporate alley-recycling pickup.
In his SUNblast, Kriseman wrote the city is “collecting and examining valuable information that will guide the program’s next steps.”
That includes examining alley widths and conditions. The city has argued alley-recycling pickup was a no-go because the trucks purchased for pickup were too large to safely navigate narrow alleys.
The city is also looking at other cities’ procedures and how alley pickups could potentially affect the rest of the city.
Alley trash collection is the norm at 40 percent of city residences.
City staff is also spending time in the field looking for citizen feedback and observations from drivers.
Following backlash from a rocky rollout, the sanitation department moved out of the purview of Public Works Administrator Mike Connors and into the Neighborhood Affairs Administration.
Kriseman wrote that the sanitation department will work seamlessly with codes compliance and the rest of the Neighborhood Affairs Administration to “provide better, more efficient services to the citizens of the Sunshine City.”
