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Residents press for recycling; city manager says Commerce pursuing controlled, sustainable restart
Summary
A resident urged the council to restore recycling in Commerce; City Manager Lisenby said staff is negotiating contract language and evaluating controlled drop‑off locations and staffing to ensure collected materials are actually recycled rather than landfilled.
During public comment, James Spencer urged the Commerce City Council to restart recycling in the city, saying residents currently haul materials to Greenville and asking why the city does not provide local recycling pickup.
City Manager Lisenby responded in his report that staff is actively evaluating options to restore recycling but highlighted national market challenges. He said that prior to 2017, most U.S. recyclables were purchased by Chinese processors; after China stopped taking material, many U.S. processors lost markets and began landfilling material that was contaminated or could not be resold.
Lisenby described Commerce’s prior arrangement with the university as a joint drop‑off where the city paid two‑thirds of the cost and the university one‑third. He said the site lacked access control and staffing, and repeated contamination — household trash in recycling containers — resulted in entire loads being landfilled by the processor. Lisenby said city staff is discussing contract changes with City Sanitation to identify a site with access control and to provide staffing or volunteer monitoring so recovered material will meet processor standards and actually be recycled.
He said the city is “close” to a workable plan but not ready to relaunch service and cautioned that recycling is only environmentally responsible “if it’s done well, and it’s not in the other landfill.” Staff plans to include recycling options in the upcoming sanitation contract renewal and present a recommendation to the council.
