First, corrugated cardboard will be banned from the Lincoln landfill, probably beginning April 1, 2017.
Newsprint will be banned the following year, on April 1, 2018.
Then a recyclable paper ban will go into effect April 1, 2019.
That’s the tentative schedule for encouraging recycling by banning the most lucrative recycling products from the landfill over a three-year period under a draft recycling proposal city officials are discussing with community leaders.
The proposed ordinance, which is still in the draft stage, would give consumers a choice: Pay their waste haulers to take their recycling and garbage at the curb, or take their recycling material to one of 28 free city recycling sites.
Many of the city's waste haulers are already moving into the recycling business ahead of the potential landfill bans, said Steve Hatten, owner of Paragon Sanitation and a member of the Lincoln Solid Waste and Recycling Association.
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Paragon has offered curbside recycling of paper, plastic and glass for the past year, and Hatten estimates that more than half of the local waste haulers offer the service as well.
All local companies are gearing up in anticipation of a ban on some material, he said. And recycling customers are "growing like dandelions."
Recycling all paper products would cut waste going into the landfill by around 28 percent, according to information presented by Donna Garden, deputy director for the Public Works and Utilities Department.
The recycling program would have a strong educational component that would begin before the initial cardboard ban, she said.
The city is banning corrugated cardboard first because it is easily recognizable and is a very valuable commodity on the market, said Garden.
Eventually, the ban will likely be extended to all fiber, or paper products, which are also profitable.
There is no demand at this time for Styrofoam, glass and plastics, said Hatten. And the ban will not extend to these materials.
Glass has its own difficulties. It really has very little value and is also a hazard that must be separated from co-mingled recyclable material, said Dale Gubbels, CEO and president of Firstar Fiber Inc., a Nebraska business that sorts recyclable material and sells it to end markets.
Glass is not even listed as a recyclable material in the proposed city ordinance.
Because of problems with collecting it and separating it from recyclables that can be sold, Hatten expects recycling and waste haulers may stop collecting glass if the city passes an ordinance that doesn't list it.
Under the recycling plan, all waste haulers would be required to offer curb recycling services to homes and businesses, although they could contract that service out to another company.
The goal is to have one bill for consumers, Garden said during a presentation at the Lincoln Chamber of Commerce this week.
Homeowners and small businesses could take recyclables banned from the landfill to the free city sites if they don't want to pay for curbside recycling, according to Rick Hoppe, chief of staff to Mayor Chris Beutler.
The penalty system for putting recyclable materials in with regular trash will be the same as it has been for yard waste, which is banned from April 1 to Dec. 1 -- a potential misdemeanor charge.
As with the leaf and grass ban, 99 percent of Lincoln will willingly comply, said Garden.
"In 22 years we have issued zero citations for the yard-waste ban," she said.
If there are issues, haulers have the option to not take materials or leave an "oops" tag or notification to inform the customer. This strategy has worked well with yard waste, she said.
If a hauler takes large quantities of banned materials to the landfill, staff will ask for it to be taken to a recycling site. A hauler who refuses will be assessed a fee.
"This is exactly the same process we already use for grass and leaves. It works very well," Garden said.
Under the proposed ordinance, all waste haulers would have to notify customers of the availability of recycling services at least twice a year, provide receptacles with tight-fitting lids and pick up recyclables at least once a week.
The recyclable material collected could not be co-mingled with waste or disposed in a landfill.
All recycling collectors would have to report annually on the amount of material collected so the city can determine how well the program is working.
Diverting 57,500 tons of recyclable paper fibers would save 82,000 cubic yards of landfill space annually, valued at $1 million.
And it could be sold for about $2.7 million, according to information from the city.
Garden said she doesn't know when Beutler will introduce the ordinance for City Council action. The plan being offered by his administration is the result of several study groups.
A 20-member solid waste task force offered recycling goals in 2013 and in March 2014 a smaller work group representing waste haulers and businesses proposed starting with a corrugated cardboard ban.
Chamber of Commerce members at the meeting had a mixed response to the proposal.
Several expressed concern about finding enough space for both recycling and trash containers.
But others said recycling is a moral imperative and can't be looked at purely from an economic viewpoint.
More than 60 percent of students look at sustainability as a part of their criteria for picking a college, said Matan Gill, co-founder of LiveBy, a company that uses data to match people with neighborhoods.
And when they graduate, they don't lose those feelings about recycling and sustainability. Many young people are looking for companies and communities that are in tune with their sentiments, he said.
At Zoetis, which recycles all fiber, paper, cans, plastic and metal, about 200 employees also get home curbside recycling paid for by the company, said Jack Coogan, the company's environmental, health and safety director.