Do it or else

In San Francisco, it will soon be a crime not to compost.

Residents and restaurants will have to compost food scraps or face fines up to $500 for not separating trash into recyclables, compostables and plain old trash, according to Nation’s Restaurant News.

The current voluntary program provides compost to farms and vineyards in the Bay area. More than 1,000 restaurants already participate because the charge for hauling off compostable material is less than for standard waste, according to the contractor who runs the city’s service.
It’s all part of a plan to divert 75 percent of the city’s waste from landfills by 2010 and to hit a zero-waste goal by 2020.

What would happen in Panhandle cities if someone proposed that? The mind boggles.
The regional recycling program headed by the Panhandle Regional Planning Commission continues to expand slowly, and Amarillo’s committee to advise on green issues is meeting Tuesday to discuss an educational presence on the city’s Web site.

But not sorting a crime?

Yikes! I can just see a city of Yosemite Sams bouncing furiously up and down with pistols drawn and puffs of smoke coming out their ears. Yikes again.