Re-Cycled Old Is New

All About Food | April 20th, 2016

A few years ago I wrote an article for this paper about re-cycling, mainly focused on the restaurant industry. When my editor asked me to write about the current state of recycling in Fargo I was curious about what might have changed. So I took to the alleys. This is where the rubber hits the road. Someone told me one time that “if the trays on an airplane weren’t clean, what did the engines look like?” That stuck with me as an actual way to judge a variety of life engaging issues.

Environmental conscience or should I say guilt? That’s a pretty heavy statement dude. What do you do with that grease you fried the chicken in or better yet what did your local restaurant do with it? But just look around in places you never look and it is apparent who just doesn’t bother. I find that concerning. Why after our last article on the subject would someone not straighten up and do better, be more cognizant of the social climate. Perhaps I should hang them out there, pretty fancy places to boot.

When I moved here five years ago one of the things that struck me was the recycling program. Every other week my glass, aluminum and paper were picked up and hopefully not just taken to the dump but actually recycled. We have parking lots and numerous other locations where you can drop off glass, aluminum, plastic and cardboard.

That’s all great, citizens are doing their best to help, but where are the restaurants on this? After all, any restaurant on a bad day would max out any household on glass and plastics. So as I did on my previous article I got out and looked around, talked to people and realized there has been some improvement.

Some is not enough. We are diligent in my neighborhood and every other week everyone puts out there recyclables. So why is it so hard for commercial businesses to do the same? Well apparently the City of Fargo will not pick-up recyclables unless you use their trash services, but independents pick up the rest. Roberts Alley, seriously an alley gets a name? This alley needs to get cleaned up.

There are places like Nichole’s Fine Pastries and the Plains Art Museum that clearly make the extra effort to make a difference. We all talk the fight, we all have lofty ideals and then reality sets in. When a person or corporation commits to believing in this kind of philosophy they really need to commit. As soon as everyone realizes they have “skin in the game” the better we will be.

I suppose I just do not understand why Fargo residential is so conscious about recycling and downtown commercial is not. There are a few downtown locations that I am pretty confident don’t seem to feel that they need to OPENLY show that their support of such a program to help our community.

You know there was a time when returning your coke bottle was worth something at the counter. Maybe a nickel towards to a 10 cent candy bar twice the size of the one you would get today. Different times back then, we didn’t litter highways or parks and we all seemed to like each other more.

We all need to step up. For the children who will inherit our mess.

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