Falls Church officials are considering whether to add composting bins to the Little City’s trash and recycling program.
While leaders hope to reduce the amount of food waste that winds up in the landfill, they acknowledged difficulties that other localities, including Arlington, have faced in implementing such a program.
The challenge: Many people aren’t currently interested in composting their food scraps, and efforts to encourage them to do so have frequently fallen flat.
“We’ve kind of hit a ceiling that we’ve been trying to break through for years now,” said Adam Riedel of Arlington’s Solid Waste Bureau, who on July 9 briefed members of Falls Church’s solid waste task force.
One of the biggest issues, he said, appears to be psychological in nature.
“The biggest hurdle we hear from people in the community is referred to as the ‘ick factor’ — there’s just something inherently icky about food scraps. That’s particularly true in the summer,” Riedel said.
He noted that in Arlington, only a fraction of residents compost food scraps to any measurable degree.
Arlington inaugurated food-scrap recycling in 2021. Food waste is commingled with yard-waste recycling, in place since 2016.
Riedel told the Falls Church task force that Arlington is not alone in having a hard time convincing residents to recycle food scraps. He pointed to comparable programs in Texas and Illinois with similar results.
“I don’t know that any community has really cracked the code,” he said. “You will get pushback from people who are tied to the old system.”
The discussion came as part of a 90-minute meeting of the task force, the third in a series of four. After a final session on Monday, July 21, the panel will finalize a report to City Manager Wyatt Shields, who will present recommendations to the City Council on Aug. 4.
Even if curbside compost collection is rolled out to all trash customers, the city plans to maintain its community composting site, located in the parking lot behind the Falls Church Community Center. That service is provided without charge to residents and businesses.
The question of organic recycling bins dominated much of the July 9 meeting, but is only one part of the solid waste task force’s broader domain.
Falls Church elected leaders appear to be leaning toward moving away from the current system, where general taxes fund trash collection for single-family properties. The city could move to an alternative where fees are charged only to properties required to use government collection, as is the case in Arlington.
Adding a third bin for organics recycling is projected to add an additional $40 to $45 annually to the costs charged to the approximately 3,000 households receiving government trash/recycling services.
The city government currently offers an optional “curbside compost” program. Just under 600 households have signed up, currently paying either $8 or $15 per month for weekly pickups, depending on the size of collection bins chosen.
The city government currently subsidizes about 60% of the cost of that program.
Responding to questions from task-force members, city staff acknowledged that composting participation among households likely would be “small” for at least a year or two if the program is rolled out across Falls Church.
Several members of the task force voiced concerns about potential smells and the possibility of vermin like racoons and rats raiding organics bins.
City Council members are hoping to have a final decision on changes to trash and recycling collection by the end of summer. If fees for the service are moved out of the city’s General Fund, there will be a reduction in the current real-estate tax rate for all property owners in the city.
Those with comments about any of the proposals can email the task force or attend the July 21 meeting, to be held at 2 p.m. at City Hall.
