The Roeland Park City Council took further steps Tuesday night toward offering curbside glass recycling to residents.
The council authorized city staff by a 6-1 vote to create a draft agreement with Ripple Glass of Kansas City, Missouri, to provide glass recycling for an estimated $94,500 a year. Ripple also would provide glass recycling services at The Boulevard apartments at 4800 Skyline Drive, the community center, R Park and Nall Park.
Key takeaways
• The city is looking to finalize an agreement with Ripple Glass that would provide curbside glass recycling.
• The program would end up adding 81 cents to the trash and recycling fees residents in a single family home would pay each month.
Ward 1 Councilmember Tom Madigan voted no. Ward 2 Councilmember Jennifer Hill was absent.
For the purpose of creating the draft agreement, the council also approved, by a 5-2 vote, applying 30.5%, or about $28,800, of the annual glass recycling cost to the solid waste assessment fee for residents. The remainder of the cost would be paid from the city’s general fund. The percentage is subject to the council’s final approval.
Madigan and Ward 4 Councilmember Michael Rebne voted no.
Increasing the percentage applied to the solid waste assessment from the city’s initially proposed 25% to 30.5% would increase the cost per single-family home from $7.95 a year to $9.70 a year, or about 81 cents a month. It also would enable a 1-mill reduction in property taxes, compared to a 0.96-mill reduction.
Madigan cited the 8.6% May inflation rate and city staff raises of 4% coming in August and January and called a solid waste bill increase “repressive.”
“Forget the curbside glass recycling for the time being and we have an opportunity to lower the mill levy even more than the currently projected 1%,” he said, adding that his “whole problem, with this is even if we get a 30% participation rate, it means 70% of the people are paying for something they don’t want.”
Mixed support for curbside recycling
Roeland Park residents’ support for curbside recycling has been mixed.
In a Roeland Park citizen survey last year to rate support for a curbside glass recycling program that would cost $3.50 a month per household (regardless of participation), 34% said they were very supportive of such a program and 34% said they were not supportive.
The city approved a six-month pilot program in August 2021 for Ripple Glass to provide biweekly curbside glass recycling services and paid the company $9,000 for the program.
Of 654 eligible households, 66% participated, and the company collected 11.2 tons of glass.
During the public comments period at Tuesday’s meeting, resident Janna Willhaus said there was “no evidence that a curbside glass recycling program in Roeland Park will significantly increase the amount of glass that’s being recycled, much less increase it enough to offset the carbon production from such a curbside program.”
“We should be looking for ways to reduce our carbon footprint,” Willhaus said. “This program will not only not reduce the carbon footprint, (but) it’s most likely not even carbon neutral. So, why are we doing it? … I know a lot of time and money went into this idea, and it must have been very disappointing when the numbers didn’t support your vision. But that’s why surveys and pilot programs are done—to get the information and then make educated decisions. If you knew that you were going to vote for this before the pilot results, why did we invest six months and $9,000?”
The city issued a request for proposals to provide curbside recycling from May 9 through June 10 this year. Ripple Glass submitted the only proposal, a summary of which is contained in this council document.
What other cities are doing
Roeland Park isn’t the first city to attempt a curbside glass pilot program, but it remains a rare service for northeast Johnson County residents.
Mission Woods started offering curbside glass recycling in 2015, becoming the first northeast Johnson County city with this service.
Prairie Village also previously conducted a curbside glass pilot through GlassBandit LLC, a Westwood-based company. Deputy City Administrator Jamie Robichaud said last summer that the city council decided during its 2021 budget discussions not to move forward with a citywide program because the cost would “be added to the solid waste assessment,” reflected on resident’s property tax bills.
Instead, the city entered into a memorandum of understanding with GlassBandit (as well as food composting companies) to offer discounted rates to Prairie Village residents and businesses, Robichaud said.
The cities of Overland Park, Lenexa and Shawnee don’t offer curbside glass recycling, but glass recycling bins are located throughout each city.
