In an effort to increase recycling, city officials are looking at a proposal that could penalize residents for creating a lot of trash. NY1’s Courtney Gross filed this report.
Imagine the more trash bags you use, the more waste you create, the more it could cost you.
"In most other large cities, you pay for your garbage collection, just like you pay for water and you pay for sewer," says Sanitation Commissioner Kathryn Garcia.
So in an attempt to reduce waste and recycle more, the de Blasio administration is exploring the idea of penalizing people who create more trash.
"We don't want to be punitive. We really want to try to get folks to do the right thing and make sure there is an incentive," Garcia says.
It's a program called "Save As You Throw" and similar initiatives have been implemented across the country.
"San Francisco, Seattle, Portland, San Jose. This has worked in other progressive cities across the country. It should also work here in New York," says Eric Goldstein of the Natural Resources Defense Council.
"Depending on how much garbage you throw away from your home to landfill, you would have to pay a price for that," says City Councilman Antonio Reynoso.
It might go something like this: you get a certain number of trash bags to fill up every year.
If you use less, then you get a credit. If you use more, then you pay for more bags.
The details are still being worked out.
"We have not designed it yet. There are a lot of different ways to do it. You can do it with bags. You can do it with stickers. Many cities use bins, but clearly that isn't very effective in the city of New York with on street parking," says Garcia.
Hypothetically, New Yorkers might recycle more and use less. For years, the city's recycling rate has hovered in and around 15 percent.
There is no specific timeline for a proposal like this to move forward, but at the same time, some officials say they are convinced it will happen.
"I definitely think it's going to happen, and I am supportive," Reynoso says.
"It is not happening tomorrow but we want to have a very strong engagement with people as we go forward," Garcia says.