Update
At the Council meeting on September 27, 2022, the City Council asked staff to work with Ridwell and the city's franchised haulers on how to best provide recycling services in Tigard. Those discussions are ongoing and we hope to have an update in the coming weeks.
Why isn’t Tigard providing recycling for hard-to-recycle items (for example, through Ridwell)?
Tigard is interested in all options to increase the availability of recycling options like Ridwell currently provides, including working with our current haulers to encourage them to expand their services. The city is committed to resiliency planning and service equity and it’s important to the City Council to put policies in place that support those initiatives. One of Tigard’s adopted Council Goals is to develop and implement a community resiliency plan that is specific to the needs of the Tigard community and organization. It includes a plan to reduce the city’s carbon footprint, implement resiliency practices that help us achieve carbon neutrality by the year 2035 and communicate our resiliency efforts to the community to encourage individuals and businesses to adopt new practices that support our climate goals.
At this time, the Tigard Municipal Code doesn’t allow Ridwell to legally operate in the city, but we continue to work with other jurisdictions and our franchised haulers to seek agreement. Right now, the process is in the hands of Oregon DEQ. Metro Councilor Garritt Rosenthal shared that his goal is, “to see that the overall system functions efficiently and that these ‘hard to recycle’ wastes get diverted from landfills and that such services are available to all income levels. Currently the matter is in the hands of the DEQ and I suspect Metro will not be in a position to make a decision before February or March of 2022.”
Cities would review their solid waste rules after that.
Tigard is also talking with our franchised waste haulers to see if they have capacity to provide a similar service. There are unanswered questions regarding Ridwell’s costs to lower income families and, of course, the ultimate destination of waste collected by Ridwell. Recycling and environmental stewardship should be available to everyone, not just those who can afford to spend a premium for an exclusive service. We all benefit from removing hard-to-recycle items from the landfill, so our policies should ensure everyone can participate, regardless of income. I understand that Metro is working on a summary of permit and licensing timelines to share with all interested parties.
We share your concern for a healthier environment and applaud your commitment to recycling.
Original source can be found here.
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