[speaker001:] okay well um let's see
[speaker002:] I understand you have more aggressive laws both in uh Washington and in Oregon than than we down here in Dallas
[speaker001:] well um yeah possibly um I'm not familiar with the laws in Texas but we've got a citywide recycling program here in Seattle that's um uh well well it's it's it's really amazing how many what's that
[speaker002:] is it mandatory is it mandatory
[speaker001:] um well they give you really good incentives uh they pick up the recycled goods they give you they drop off containers at your house so it's like it's like garbage collection um and you don't pay for it
[speaker002:] uh-huh
[speaker001:] and uh you same uh basically at the same time they jack the garbage rates way up and and made it so you had to have city provided garbage cans that were of uniform size
[speaker002:] uh-huh
[speaker001:] so we were amazed when we you know recycling's one of these things that we did kind of once and awhile but it was uh you know something that I always put off because you had to haul the stuff and and so I you know we didn't do it much but I was amazed at how much we reduced the uh
[speaker002:] the volume
[speaker001:] the uh the volume of our trash
[speaker002:] well Ted down here we've had the uh containers available in you know various public places now since the mid seventies but just in the last few days there's been a proposal now to have uh I believe it's about six times four to six times a month they'll have a curb pick-up they'll give you containers that are color coded so you can put cans and glass and
[speaker001:] yeah it's like what we have yeah
[speaker002:] but the difference is we have to pay for that
[speaker001:] oh really
[speaker002:] about three dollars and um twenty cents or so or something like that I I was about half asleep when they were talking about it on the news but um it is not going to go over too well as long as you have to pay a premium to participate I don't believe
[speaker001:] yeah unless they structure the garbage rates so that uh you know it like works out to be cheaper
[speaker002:] well the garbage rates here are high however as long as you bag it in plastic bags you can put out up to ten or twelve bags of of trash
[speaker001:] oh my yeah they stopped that here they used to have it so that like you could get two can service and you could have huge cans you know that you furnished yourself
[speaker002:] uh-huh
[speaker001:] and then you could put a bag out with each can and in fact if you put out more than that they'd pick it up anyway and now they've really tightened up course there's some down sides to this too um there's I don't I I don't know I hear that there's more of a problem with illegal dumping after this when it you know after the rates went up
[speaker002:] I suspect we're having some of that here too
[speaker001:] and yeah and then uh the other thing is what do they do with all the stuff they're just they're going to recycle they now have this huge glut of paper um and it's difficult to find markets for it so the as a result the um price of recycled paper has gone way down because you know there isn't there isn't enough demand for it all
[speaker002:] yes well we've had some what the same problem here I think newsprint's down something like um under a dollar now per hundred weight
[speaker001:] oh my
[speaker002:] and it used to be two and three and I think it even got above three at one point
[speaker001:] yeah remember when the boy scouts used to do paper drives and make money
[speaker002:] yes yes there used to be a recycling center where you'd take things in and you know they'd weigh it and pay you and they had paper and of course aluminum cans which are still very viable here
[speaker001:] yeah
[speaker002:] and they had uh clear glass and colored glass but I noticed recently that place has closed up now my daughter's really active active in some of this and she there's a place oh about eight or nine miles well I guess it's about six miles from here where you can go and uh few things they pay you for most things they just take
[speaker001:] yeah
[speaker002:] but um the movement here has not really progressed there's Texas is always slow on a lot of these things
[speaker001:] yeah I understand until recently you could actually have an open container in your in your pick-up as you go down the road there
[speaker002:] um yeah that was kind of disastrous of course we've had um major problems with them driving while intoxicated and all that I think they're finally starting to get things a little a little more squared away but they're a long way from that yet uh Texas has always had a tradition of uh people staying away from I mean laws the laws really leaving you alone unless you were clearly doing something
[speaker001:] right uh it's it's out of the old west you know like you know
[speaker002:] yes just recently there there now uh well up until recently you could have a a rifle behind the seat of your pickup and all that kind of stuff and now they're starting to discourage you from that um
[speaker001:] yeah
[speaker002:] and in there's parts of town here now where