Nassau Recycles????

  I am new to this county, I moved here in September from Jacksonville and from a small town in NY state 4 years ago. Nassau county is beautiful - peaceful and quiet with lots of trees, land and open space. I love it here.

I have recycled for at least 25 years now. In NY state it was mandatory - our garbage collectors would not take recycling - it was left for you to deal with properly. NY has a bottle bill. Lots of folks earn money collecting the bottles and it certainly cuts down on roadside litter .

I moved to Florida to enjoy the beauty and warmth of this wonderful state. I am not comparing NY to Fla. to say NY is better,  I am wondering why recycling is not done here - where there is so much beauty to save and so many people who have moved here from other states that recycle?Why is this county so far behind the times? There is big money in recycling too - more money for the county. Money for some entrepreneur to make.

Since moving to this county, I have been trying to recycle. It has been an incredibly frustrating experience. First, I was appalled that there is no recylcling pickup in Western Nassau like there is in Eastern Nassau. So, ok,I will transport myself.  I have been saving my recycling in the garage until I could find a place to take it. Another incredibly frustating experience - I cannot find where to take it all! I looked on the keep Nassau beautiful website which listed 3 places.

I loaded my stuff in the car and went to site #1 - this one turned out to take newspapers only for the "convenince of residents", it is otherwise a private business in the metal recycling business.  So, on to site #2, again, not much better - behind the Humane Society there are bins for glass and newspapers. Ok that's good - but where do plastics and cardboard go?? On to site #3 this site is not - there was nothing there - no recycling bins or signs etc. nothing at all!

During my frustrating travels, I flagged down a Nassau policeman - and asked him where I could take recycling materials. He didn't know but made a call. That person told him to send me to site #1- the private metal recycling business. The police officer said to me that it's hard to recycle here because "everyone here is a backward lazy southerner!" Others have told me everyone just burns stuff in the backyard! I can hardly believe this to be true!

So, home I came with cardboard and plastics. I read the My Nassau Sun this morning which had a front page article about holiday trash. It said there is a readers poll about recycling - go to website and vote! Yahoo! I thought - I can vote and maybe there are others on that site who would like to recycle. Perhaps we can do something constructive. Get pickup started in Western Nassau County for one!

Well, I have been on this site for awhile today looking for this poll - can't find it. Is it hidden somewhere? While looking around for the poll, I decided to join - so I could write down my frustration with Recycling in Nassau County. I hope there are others out there who are concerned about this very important issue. If we don't stop filling the landfills and Ocean with garbage - especially things that can be recycled, Nassau County, as well as the world, will not be so beautiful any more!