Emanuel wants crackdown on high-rise recycling scofflaws

Residential and commercial high-rises thumbing their noses at the city’s recycling requirement would face hefty fines, under a mayoral crackdown proposed Wednesday.

During an action-packed City Council meeting dominated by the sharing economy, Mayor Rahm Emanuel quietly took aim at high-rises that have been skirting the recycling requirement.

Streets and Sanitation spokesperson Jennifer Martinez said the city has “received complaints from residents saying their buildings don’t recycle.”

”In order to help enforce the already existing ordinance, and give these residents the ability to recycle in high-rise and commercial buildings, Chicago needed to update the ordinance,” Martinez told the Chicago Sun-Times.

Emanuel wants to amend Chicago’s 20-year old recycling ordinance to spell out the specific responsibilities of building owners and add enforcement tools to the city’s arsenal.

The new ordinance would require property owners of multi-unit residential, office and commercial buildings to provide “source-separated, single stream recycling.”

That means recyclable need to be separated from normal waste and remain segregated until pick-ups arranged and paid for by the buildings.

That’s described as the most commonly used collection method in the industry.

Property owners would also be responsible for educating tenants and lease holders. That campaign must include posting signs, providing adequate carts and sending written notice to tenants about the change and the recycling expected of them.

The Emanuel administration says it worked with organizations like the Chicago Recycling Coalition and My Building Doesn’t Recycle to craft the ordinance.

Streets and Sanitation will be responsible for enforcement, armed with a sliding scale of fines.

Penalties include: $500 to $1,000 for the first offense; $1,000 to 2,500 for second offense within 12 months; and $2,500 to $5,000 for the third violation and any ones after that within 12 months of the most recent violation.