A majority of aldermen gave their support Wednesday to a proposal to overhaul Chicago’s residential recycling program within three years.
Encouraged by high participation in a pilot recycling effort on the Southwest Side, Ald. Joe Moore (49th) introduced a plan to expand that approach to every corner of the city.
Twenty-six of the 50 City Council members signed on as co-sponsors of the measure calling for the city to collect recyclables separately from other garbage in curbside bins, as is the practice in most other U.S. cities and Chicago suburbs.
But Mayor Richard Daley’s administration says it can’t afford to do that, and the mayor has continued to defend his blue bag program. Under that system, households are asked to place paper, plastic, cans and other recyclables in bags that are tossed into garbage trucks along with other waste.
Moore conceded that it is unlikely the council would buck the mayor on this issue. But he said he hopes it would push the Daley administration to “examine closely how we can expand the pilot in the Beverly neighborhood so everyone can enjoy the benefits of recycling.”
Streets and Sanitation Department spokesman Matt Smith said Moore’s proposal is ill-advised because the city lacks the money to replace the blue-bag program.
Smith said he does not know how much it would cost to expand the Beverly approach to the entire city. “I don’t have the numbers, but it would be tremendously costly,” he said.
Officials say the pilot program costs the city $1 for every household each week. Streets and Sanitation trucks collect garbage from 700,000 homes.
Smith said the sale of recyclables collected in Beverly does not offset the cost of extra pickups.
Moore’s proposal notes that the city only recycles 8 percent of its garbage, far short of the 25 percent goal set by the mayor when he introduced blue bag recycling 10 years ago.
Only 13 percent of homes use blue bags, compared with 80-percent participation in the Beverly program.
“There is general agreement in the City Council that blue bag is not working,” Ald. Thomas Murphy (18th) said.
But aldermen repeatedly have refused to cross Daley to vote for proposals that most of them signed onto as co-sponsors. “Some people will sign. But when push comes to shove, they may not vote for it,” Murphy said.
Also Wednesday, the council confirmed the appointment of new Health Commissioner Terry Mason.
Mason is pressing aldermen to get into shape as an example for a city labeled the fattest in the U.S. by Men’s Fitness magazine. While the appointment was widely welcomed, several of the more portly aldermen privately were not impressed with his pledge to kick the legislators and the rest of the city into shape.
In other council business, Daley reiterated plans to press for property tax changes that would help homeowners.
Daley and Cook County Assessor James Houlihan said they intend to lobby state legislators to make the 7 percent property tax cap permanent. The three-year life of the cap, which limits jumps in residential property tax to 7 percent, needs to be renewed this year if local residents are to avoid huge increases in 2007, they said.
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Daley also said the city had struck a deal with insurance giant CNA Financial Corp. for its headquarters to remain in the city. While the redevelopment agreement for the company’s 45-story building at 333 S. Wabash Ave. would save 2,000 jobs and provide 200 new ones, the $63.6 million project has been given $13.7 million in tax credits and assistance.
The council also adopted changes designed to help the businesses that could be hurt by a bleachers-expansion project at Wrigley Field that would result in higher outfield walls.
The measure advanced by Ald. Thomas Tunney (44th) allows most rooftop clubs bordering Wrigley Field to have seating up to 69 feet high, eight feet higher than the current limit. Clubs outside Wrigley’s foul poles would be able to go up by two feet to 63 feet.
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