Santa Cruz Sentinel

From the right perspective, a rolling grassy hill in Wilder Ranch State Park often appears to be covered with melting snow, splotches of mostly white clusters draped across bushes and tree limbs alike.

The scene, not far from the Santa Cruz landfill, in an otherwise bucolic landscape actually is a blanket of retail plastic bags. It is just one physical reminder of the a losing battle that Santa Cruz Resource Recovery Facility workers spend their time battling.

At the recycling facility, immediately identifiable by its giant bound paper and plastic bales and loud clamor of bottles and cans clanking along a metal conveyor belt, trucks back one-by-one into a giant open-ended tentlike structure. There, the recycling material is dumped onto a concrete floor and spread out before being loaded onto the conveyor belt, ascending up into the indoor second floor part of the recycling operation.

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