RECYCLING IS BIG NEWS IN CHICAGO

The Chicago Park District Leads The Way

by Reanetta Hunt-Craft, Chicago Park District

"That was the White House on the line," said an excited Fred White, Recycling Project Manager.

"Al, the President of the United States may consider our recycling program one of the top 10 environmental programs in the country." Al is Alton Neiman, who along with Fred White and Leonard Lauricella are spearheading the Chicago Park District-based recycling agenda.

White hastily hung-up the phone and rushed to mail the requested information [tapes, press releases]. The White House caller planned to review the Park District's recycling program in an ongoing National Conference of Mayors.

White says that often the excitement is almost unbelievable.

"Sometimes it's a reporter from a television station who calls, sometimes it's someone from another governmental entity, or maybe even a park patron."

But this call was from the nation's capital and according to White it was unquestionably the most exciting call that he has ever taken.

It was just a couple of years ago when the Chicago Park District kicked-off what has now become a major full-time recycling campaign. The program has come a long way, progressing past the mere collection of aluminum cans and paper to the big ticket — post-consumer plastic.

Last summer the park district signed an agreement with an Iowa based recycling company who agreed to recycle post-consumer plastic into plastic timbers which are now used on playgrounds across the City of Chicago.

"This program is bigger than we anticipated," said White. "We were legitimately concerned about minimizing the waste our trucks were carrying to landfills, and about the labor cost involved."

It's amazing that as a result of both, we have embarked upon a program that we believe must be one of the greatest environmental programs in the country.

Throughout the 563 parks in the Chicago Park system, patrons are encouraged to bring their plastic milk, pop and water containers to their nearest park district field house. The containers are picked up and taken to a central recycling location and finally to Iowa Falls, Iowa where they are transformed into useable plastic timbers.

The plastic returns to Chicago in the form of timbers that are used to build containment walls on playgrounds (see photo).

"There's no doubt, this is truly a great product and a great program for dealing with the landfill crisis," says Park District Executive Vice President, Jesse D. Madison. "It's difficult to imagine a product more suitable for our needs."

Jesse D. Madison poses by the plastic timber with Chicago Park District staff and corporate sponsors, after recycling conference at Chicago Park District's Administration Building. Pictured (left to right) Floyd Hammer, Hammer Plastic Recycling Company; Jesse D. Madison, Executive Vice President of the Chicago Park District; Joyce Charmatz, Chicago Clean Streak; Malcolm Chester, Pepsi Cola Executive; Fred White, Chicago Park District; Don Nash, Vice President, Coca-Cola Company; and Leonard Lauricella, Chicago Park District.

Plastic is longer-lasting and more durable than wood. The color is permanent through and through, and graffiti washes off easily.

The recycling program melts almost effortlessly into the playground rehabilitation program which includes also using woodchips on the surface of playlots. Madison says the woodchips make falls easier and as a result, are much safer for children.

By committee vote, the model plastic recycling program is now called, "POP" which stands for Plastics on Parks — and has served as the basis for many auxiliary "plastics" generating projects, all of which have attracted broad-based support and participation from communities and businesses. The "Recycling For A Bicycle" contest resulted in 18 lucky Park District daycampers winning shiny 10-speed bikes. Through the "Pitching for Plastics" contest a young park patron won four box-seat tickets to a Chicgo Cubs game and threw the first ceremonial pitch from the mound of Wrigley Field.

A 7 year-old won prime skybox tickets to a Bears game in a "POP for Skybox" contest.

The latest promotion is called the "Recycle with Michael" contest where the winner will receive 2 tickets to a Bulls game, meet basketball star Michael Jordan, and receive a Jordan-autographed basketball.

The City of Chicago and over a dozen corporations like Coca-Cola, Pepsi-Bottlers, Inc., Hinckley & Schmitt, Seven-up and Dean's milk have all agreed to participate in the Park District's program. Most companies have agreed to put the POP logo on all their plastic packaged products [beverages] in the market place.

Youth participation is constantly encouraged and, at the time of this writing, a local television station, CBS owned WBBM - Channel 2 — has agreed to promote recycling year-round as part of its 1990 focus on environmental issues.

To date over 240,000 pounds of plastic have been collected.

According to White, "Recycling just gets bigger and better."

"We would eventually like to see this kind of recycling effort take place all over the country," concludes Madison. "In fact our park district motto has become 'Build Playgrounds, Not Landfills.'"