Audit calls state a recycling laggard

TALLAHASSEE -- In 1988, with Florida landfills overflowing, Republican Gov. Bob Martinez ordered all state agencies to start recycling immediately.

"I believe the best way to show my commitment to recycling is to lead by example, and to get all of state government to join in," he said.

Fourteen years later, a new report says state government has been anything but a leader in recycling.

By reviewing records, talking to building managers and even pawing through garbage, auditors found that more than half the trash collected from state office buildings in the capital city could be recycled -- but isn't. The state had a contractor who collected and recycled office paper from state buildings for free. But that contract ran out in October, and no new contract has been signed. In the meantime, the state is paying Waste Management Inc. $9,341 a month to haul office paper to the recycler, the report says.

The state has no organized program to recycle aluminum cans. Informally, janitors and maids do.

Elsewhere in Florida, the state's universities and prisons aren't always recycling the way they should be under the law, the auditors found.

"State government, which is Florida's largest employer, does a poor job recycling materials," says the report released Friday by the Legislature's auditing arm, the Office of Program Policy Analysis and Government Accountability.

The New York State prison system, which is similar in size to Florida's, saved some $1.2-million by recycling in 1999-2000, auditors found. By comparison, Florida's prisons saved about $80,000.

Auditors said "it would be helpful for the governor and agency heads to underscore the need for recycling."

In December, after the St. Petersburg Times published photographs of loads of state office paper being dumped at the landfill outside Tallahassee, Gov. Jeb Bush pledged to make changes.

Since then, the administration has set up a committee to look at ways to revive recycling at state agencies, said Bush spokeswoman Elizabeth Hirst.

The state auditors also found that county recycling programs have not met the 30 percent statewide recycling goal they were supposed to meet by 1994. Today's statewide recycling rate, according to the Department of Environmental Protection, is about 28 percent.

The biggest problem, auditors found, is that businesses aren't recycling enough. Businesses create most of the trash in Florida, but have low recycling rates.

The DEP has been trying to encourage more businesses to recycle. The DEP offers free advice and grants to businesses, and plans to work with the hotel and motel industry to increase recycling.

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