Thirty years after New Jersey became the first state in the nation to mandate recycling, it still has not reached the goal of throwing away no more than half the waste generated by residents and businesses.
In fact, after getting off to a good start, and achieving a 45 percent recycling rate in 1995, eight years into the new law, the percentage of recycled municipal solid waste began dropping. The rate bottomed out in 2003 at 33 percent of paper, glass, plastic, batteries, tires, motor oil, food waste, grass, leaves, and some other items generated by homes, schools, and businesses. After remaining low for years, the rate has begun creeping back up this decade, reaching a level of 43 percent in 2015, the most recent year for which data is available from the state Department of Environmental Protection.
Still, New Jersey’s recycling rate exceeds that of the nation as a whole — 41 percent of municipal waste recycled in the state in 2014, compared with 35 percent nationally that year (2015 U.S. data are not yet available).
Critics say Gov. Chris Christie’s nearly annual diversion of funds from the state’s Clean Energy Fund to plug holes in the budget is at least partly to blame for New Jersey’s inability to reach its 50 percent recycling goal.
“Christie is stealing the recycling money,” said Jeff Tittel, director of the New Jersey chapter of the Sierra Club. “That money could be used for education.”
The governor, with legislative approval, diverted $236 million from the fund — about 60 percent of its total — to subsidize other spending in last year’s budget. During Christie’s tenure, more than $1.5 billion has been diverted from the fund, which is financed by a surcharge on customers’ gas and electric bills.
