Richmond Hill could start requiring residents to put their lawn trimmings into paper bags for pickup.
The city currently allows leaves, limbs and other items commonly referred to as dry trash to be put into plastic bags. The city then picks the dry trash up every other week.
But it’s getting too costly and environmentally unsound to continue the practice, officials said at Tuesday’s regular City Council meeting.
“We’ve got to go green,” Mayor Harold Fowler said. “Plastic bags, whether you put them in our landfill or anywhere else, they’re there for 20, 30 years.”
Richmond Hill City Manager Chris Lovell said the city picked up and hauled 1,065 tons of dry trash from residences to a landfill from January 2011 to January 2012, an amount he expected to be similar this year.
The service costs the city about $50 a ton or $80,000 annually to provide, he said.
“We used to compost it, but it’s become cost prohibitive to screen it with the plastic bags and it’s easier to get a landfill to take it when it’s in paper bags,” Lovell said. “We’re just looking for a better way to get a handle on the problem.”

Read full story in Oct. 5 issue of the Bryan County News.