Mayor Gavin Newsom: The case for composting

San Franciscans are remarkable people in myriad ways, which is why it's so rewarding to be a public servant here.

San Franciscans want to do the right thing for the environment, we are open to new ideas, and we recycle with the best of them!

Currently, 70 percent of our city's total waste stream is diverted from the landfill. There's no other metropolitan city in the United States that even comes close. This is due in part to the comprehensive and easy-to-use recycling programs that we've developed.

But San Franciscans themselves deserve no small share of the credit for conscientiously putting the right things in the right colored carts: bottles, cans, clean paper and almost all plastic in the blue; food scraps, plant clippings and soiled paper in the green. More than one third of the material currently going to the landfill could be put in the green cart and turned into organic soil - which is used on Bay Area parks, farms and vineyards.

Our goal is to get to 75 percent diversion by 2010, and if we captured everything that could be recycled (mostly paper) and everything that could be composted (almost entirely food scraps), we'd be diverting 90 percent of our waste stream.

But, unfortunately, the people who could make the biggest difference currently have limited access to our programs. Astonishingly, only about 20 percent of our large multi-family buildings have the green cart for compostables collection. The most frequent telephone calls the Department of the Environment's Zero Waste Program receives is an apartment dweller who asks: "How can I get composting happening at my building?"

It's really a simple operation, as Linda Corso, manager at Cathedral Hill Apartments, has discovered. She gives residents a green pail to use in the kitchen to collect food scraps and when the pail is full, they take it to the end of the hall and dump it in a slim green container which is sitting next to its blue and black counterparts.

Linda has made it just as easy to do the right thing with leftovers as it is to throw them out. Despite how easy it is in most cases for apartments - and businesses - to take advantage of our recycling and composting programs, some building managers perceive insurmountable hurdles and, regardless of their tenants' pleas, refuse to put in green cart service.

In some cases there are legitimate space issues, but oftentimes it's a lack of motivation or understanding. In order to move those remaining big apartment buildings and commercial operations into the mainstream, I've introduced legislation that will require all residents and businesses to have recycling and composting service. (And yes, we'll make common sense exceptions when conditions simply don't allow for it.)

Trash service has been mandatory in San Francisco since at least 1932, so it's really about time. I'm certain that the new, increased volume of compostables will help us meet and exceed our goals. But more importantly, San Franciscans that live in large apartments, as well as commercial tenants, will enjoy the full benefits of the programs the City offers, and can join with neighbors in working for the common good of the city we love so well.

Gavin Newsom is the mayor of San Francisco.