Clampdown on West Chester recycling bins is ridiculous

If West Chester Mayor Jordan Norley’s clampdown enforcing a 30-gallon recycling bin ordinance is any reflection of how he would manage this borough he will not be getting my vote.

Last week the recycling collectors refused to empty my bin because it is a 32-gallon bin and not a 30-gallon bin - how is this logical and, in any way, how does this help our recycling effort?

This is ridiculous in the extreme, for several reasons.

1. Recycling weighs a lot less than garbage, so the enforcement is certainly not to protect the health and safety of the collectors.

2. Norley should be encouraging residents to recycle more - not less.

3. If I am forced to buy a new bin, should I condemn my now useless old bin to the mountain of plastic waste the borough is already producing, thus increasing the scale of the problem? I will not do this.

The ordinance is ridiculous in the extreme and the enforcement of it is unreasonably draconian.

I started a thread on ‘’my next door” last week - and Norley should read it. Many comments tell of residents seeing recycling collectors throwing the blue bin contents into the same truck, in the same place as the garbage. Two responses describe visits to the trash dump, one of them as a member of an official delegation from the borough, and seeing the trash and recycling dumped in the same place.

How about if the mayor actually comes up with ordinances that encourage recycling rather than discouraging it?

My 32-gallon bin will be out in the alley next week and the week after. I am not going to contribute to the problem by adding my old bin to the trash and if you are really dumping both in the same place - I will just put the recycling you don’t take straight into the garbage cans.

When I lived in Milan recently, we had no trash we had paper, metal, glass and plastic recycling and anything else went for organic composting. I suggest you come up with constructive ordinances such as this rather than pontificating on an arbitrary 30 gallon limit.

Further - drop the idea of bringing the train back to West Chester - didn’t this last year teach you that the world (including West Chester) has moved on? Spend the money on programs that benefit the people of West Chester and Chester County.