Tag: recycling

May 27

2014

Buffalo’s recycling program still struggles

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Buffalo is trying to burnish its green credentials with big public investments to clean up its waterways and attract clean energy companies. Recycling is an easier lift, but the city’s anemic program is plagued by fits and starts. City Hall took the major step of distributing green recycling totes to residents in late 2011. Last year, Mayor Byron Brown hired a full-time recycling coordinator. But City Hall is otherwise batting 0 for 4 when it comes to building a successful program. As a result, the city’s curbside recycling rate has leveled off and remains less than half the national average.[...]

Posted 10 years ago

May 27

2014

Subpar recycling effort in suburbs

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Dumpster divers in Niagara Falls find jackpots 5 cents at a time in the form of cans and bottles by the bagful in the garbage. A scruffy man who regularly pulls the bottles and cans out of the trash behind Hyde Park Ice Pavillion said his motivation is simple: “M-O-N-E-Y.” A few minutes of work earned him $12 the April afternoon he spoke to a reporter. That lesson is lost on officials in most of the largest cities and towns in Niagara and Erie counties, where recycling programs are largely an afterthought, an Investigative Post analysis has found. Most of the localities[...]

Posted 10 years ago

Jan 30

2014

Recycling comes to Buffalo public housing

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The Buffalo Municipal Housing Authority is finally launching a recycling program that should service all 30 of its developments by the end of this year. This decision comes almost 10 months after Investigative Post reported that the authority was ignoring a longstanding city ordinance that requires residents of multi-family residences to recycle. The authority is the city’s biggest landlord with 4,748 apartments that are home to 7,642 low-income families and senior citizens. “It is something that we looked as the responsible thing to do and we want to do the right thing,” said Modesto Candelario, the authority’s assistant executive director.[...]

Posted 10 years ago

Sep 18

2013

Recycling progress at City Hall

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Two small steps to bolster Buffalo’s lackluster recycling efforts: Recycling totes have been placed throughout City Hall, and UB law students are poised to draft legislation that would bring city’s recycling mandates into compliance with state law. A report by Investigative Post’s Dan Telvock.

Posted 11 years ago

Sep 11

2013

Buffalo City Hall finally recycling

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Buffalo residents have recycled for more than 20 years. But only until recently have employees in City Hall. These new recycling containers appeared in City Hall about a month ago. Investigative Post examined the city’s anemic recycling program with this story in February. Since then the city has made several moves to improve the program. Most notably, Public Works on May 2 hired Susan Attridge as the recycling coordinator, a position that had sat vacant since 2009. The new recycling containers are on each floor of City Hall.  

Posted 11 years ago

Jun 17

2013

Buffalo misses big savings with food compost

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Some critics of New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg say he hasn’t done enough to boost his city’s recycling rate. Similar criticism has been aimed at Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown, whose administration has seen some modest success with the green totes rolled out in December 2011 and a recycling coordinator hired last month after a four year vacancy. Neither city has been able to reach the national average rate for recycling of 34 percent. Buffalo’s curbside recycling rate for 2012 was 12.2 percent; New York City’s rate is about 15 percent. Bloomberg isn’t settling for below average. He started a pilot[...]

Posted 11 years ago

May 17

2013

Eric Mower says ‘no mas’

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  A public relations firm cast in a bad light by its no-bid contract with the Buffalo Municipal Housing Authority that paid up to $325 an hour is walking away from the work. Eric Mower + Associates sent the BMHA a letter today (Friday) saying it won’t compete for the new contract the authority put out to bid earlier this week. “In this climate we can’t help our client right now,” said Greg Loh, the firm’s managing partner. When asked what he meant by “this climate,” Loh responded: “I think that speaks for itself.” The housing authority, landlord to some 10,000 low-income[...]

Posted 11 years ago

May 17

2013

City Hall progress on recycling

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Two recent developments appear to signal that Buffalo officials are getting more serious about recycling after a series of reports by Investigative Post documenting serious shortcomings in the city’s efforts. One is a symbolic measure: The Buffalo Common Council on Tuesday passed a resolution calling on the Buffalo Municipal Housing Authority to gets its recycling act together. As we reported May 1, even though the City Charter mandates that all commercial and multi-family complexes recycle, the authority doesn’t have a comprehensive recycling program for its 27 developments that serve some 10,000 low-income and elderly residents. Council Members Joseph Golombek Jr.[...]

Posted 11 years ago
Investigative Post

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