Last March, when city officials were prepping City Council members on the roll out of the long-awaited recycling program, Darden Rice asked how many of the city’s 81,000 or so households were expected to participate.
After the first year, city officials said, they hoped to boost participation by 10 percent or 800 more households than the 8,000 that already voluntarily recycled with a private company.
“I think we can do a little bit better,” Rice deadpanned.
Turns out, she was right. In fact, the city did a lot better. In December, 50.4 percent of the city’s households recycled.