Diggin’ Dallas: How 9 Simple Waste Digs May Sway Council’s Vote for a Commercial Recycling Ordinance

sand box

OVERVIEW:

In August 2018, the Dallas City Council voted to approve a recycling ordinance for all multi-family dwellings with 8 units or more. By January 1, 2020, all affected multi-family properties must provide access to recycling for staff and tenants and provide educational training.

 

Through a Meadows Foundation grant, Texas Campaign for the Environment Fund (TCEF) contracted our company, Zero Waste Strategies, LLC (ZWS), to conduct 9 waste and recycling characterization studies within the Dallas city limits. The studies determined the current and potential recycling rates of different types of businesses, such as restaurants, hotels, multi-family complexes, and office buildings.

 

The findings of our waste studies were presented to the participating businesses and to the Dallas City Council to provide a cross-sectional view of business recycling rates or lack thereof. This reporting will help inform the Council’s decision-making process of potentially expanding the multi-family recycling ordinance to include all commercial properties. This vote is anticipated in mid-2019, but we also hope a vote to require food-permitted businesses to divert organic wastes from landfills will also be on the docket soon.

RECRUITMENT:

Waste audit recruitment had to happen on 2 fronts: Business participants to give us materials to sort and volunteers to help sort the materials. 

The recruitment process to get businesses enrolled in our complimentary program was surprisingly challenging. Even though we had concise, but impactful scripts for outreach, as always, getting to the correct contact was the biggest obstacle. Because ZWS was already funded through the non-profit contractor, offering our services for free seemed to raise a red flag for those businesses we approached.

We would go through gatekeeper after gatekeeper after gatekeeper to finally get to the correct person, only to hear an “out of office” message. Leaving a voicemail, following up with an email, and crossing our fingers for a response was not going to get us the participants we needed. It was decided that we should expand our reach and turned to employ interns who could help with phone and email outreach.

Enrolling the businesses that actually showed interest was a bit tricky. Because we wanted to get a good cross-section of the business community, we also had to consider where the potential business participants were located within the Dallas city limits. For example, our study would be skewed if we recruited all businesses from the downtown area, but didn’t address lower-income areas and communities of color. Of the 9 waste audits scheduled and performed, 4 were in the downtown area and the other 5 were fairly spread throughout the quadrants of the city.

For the recruitment of waste audit volunteers, we had to play the game a little differently. Our call out to the community was amplified by the DFW GreenSource publication and on social media. We appealed to those wanting to gain the fundamentals and hands-on experience with waste audits.

Respondents had to sign an accident waiver and detail which days they were available to help. Whether it was just one waste audit or several over several days, every set of hands we could get was appreciated.

STUDY SAMPLES & METHODOLOGIES:

Landfill Trash – Each landfill trash bag was carefully sifted to identify and separate recyclable materials, such as cardboard, mixed paper, metals, rigid plastics, and glass from landfill trash items. Each recyclable was placed with like items in containers. For accuracy, full containers of landfill trash and sorted recyclables were individually placed on a tared scale and weighed. Each measurement was recorded manually on a printed spreadsheet labeled with each recycling category listed above.

Usually, the recyclable materials recovered from the landfill trash samples were too contaminated to be recycled, so they had to be returned to the landfill trash dumpster.

Recycling – ZWS had a goal of not only sorting and weighing the recyclable materials collected, but also identifying any contaminants in the recycling stream that could lower the value of those recyclable commodities. The materials pulled from the recycling dumpster were sorted and weighed and any contaminants were pulled, weighed, cataloged, and placed with the previously measured landfill trash debris.

Organics – For businesses that had a food permit, all organic materials (food waste, floral decor, etc.) were weighed separately from the recyclable and landfill trash materials. None of the businesses we audited had a composting program or other food diversion efforts as part of their operations, so all food waste was pulled from landfill trash bags and some recycling bags.

As volunteers showed up each day, the ZWS team would take time to train each volunteer on proper techniques for sorting recyclables and food waste from landfill trash. They were supplied with gloves, goggles, and shoe wraps, among other safety precautions. As materials were being pulled, they had questions about what was recyclable and what was not. We address each concern to ensure they were sorted properly.

As we wrapped up each waste audit at each property, the sorted bags were placed in the proper dumpster and the business property was cleaned to show no trace of activity.

REPORTING:

After the project was completed, a customized report was developed for each property where observations, graphs highlighting waste totals and percentages, and data conclusions were offered. Based on each property’s baseline measurements and diversion numbers, appropriate recommendations for Zero Waste “best practices” were also reported to help the business participants along in either getting a diversion program started or expanding current diversion programs.

These reports were delivered to the Dallas City Council for review and will hopefully be used to justify the expansion of the apartment recycling ordinance to include all commercial properties and food businesses.

 

OTHER SERVICES:

Zero Waste Strategies offers the following services to help businesses and governments enact waste diversion programs:

  • Waste audits to determine baseline measurements
  • Review of inventory and purchasing practices
  • Provide Service Opportunity Analysis to pinpoint diversion options for reuse and donations
  • Hauling contract renegotiations
  • Zero Waste training for management and employees
  • Building partnerships with other like-minded businesses in the area
  • Provide a green marketing edge

 

FACILITATORS

Meadows Foundation (grant funders):

Mission – To assist people and institutions of Texas improve the quality and circumstances of life for themselves and future generations.

Vision – To exemplify the principles of its founder in addressing basic human needs by working toward the elimination of ignorance, hopelessness, and suffering; protecting the environment; providing cultural enrichment; encouraging excellence; and promoting understanding and cooperation among people.

 

Texas Campaign for the Environment Fund (grant recipient and client of ZWS)

Mission – To engage people and communities through face-to-face public education, grassroots organizing, and action-oriented research for a cleaner and healthier Texas.

TCE Fund is registered with the IRS and the State of Texas as a 501c3 non-profit organization. Contributions to TCE Fund are 100% tax deductible.

 

Zero Waste Strategies, LLC (ZWS – service contractor for waste studies)

Mission – To assist businesses and local governments in saving financial and material resources by building long-term, sustainable practices and boosting the visibility and leadership efforts of those “Going Zero”.

By implementing Zero Waste communities can work together to bring economic vitality and diverse job streams for a more secure local tax base.

ZWS is a registered S-Corp based in Austin, TX holding membership status with the US Zero Waste Business Council, the US Green Building Council, and the Austin Green Business Leaders Program. ZWS has contracted with multinational corporations, such as Nestle Purina and Kohler Co., to implement Zero Waste programs and staff training. ZWS currently contracts with the City of Austin to provide outreach and education to assist businesses in complying with the Universal Recycling Ordinance (URO).