By ROBIN SHANNON

Staff Reporter

LAPLACE – St. John administrative officials will use results of a telephone and Internet poll to determine the feasibility of a parish-wide recycling program.

The three-day poll, which just wrapped up Friday evening, questioned residents across all seven districts of St. John Parish to determine their interest in recycling. St. John Public Information Officer Buddy Boe said the parish will use the results to determine which districts, if any, will participate in a pilot program for curbside recycling. He said the results would be ready some time early next week.

“The districts that return a majority vote in favor of the program will be the ones we select to participate,” said Boe. “It could be just one, all, or none, and we felt we needed to gauge interest before going forward.”

Boe said as part of the pilot curbside program, residences in the chosen districts would be presented with 32-gallon covered rolling carts that would be picked up weekly. He said the parish would pay a $3.85 fee per household, and each participating residence would be billed $2.50, which would appear on the water bill.

Boe said SWDI, the company responsible for the parish’s garbage pickup, would be responsible for the curbside collection of plastics, paper, and aluminum. The program is scheduled to begin July 1.

In addition to curbside pickup, Boe said the pilot program would also consist of several drop off recycling bins, which would be placed in several locations throughout the parish for residents to drop off recyclables at their own convenience free of charge.

“As of now, those locations are unknown, but we are probably looking at about four or five parish-wide,” said Boe. “The parish actually already has one behind the parish offices on the east bank, but it’s not well publicized.”

District 7 Councilwoman Cheryl Millet posed the idea of a recycling program to Parish President Bill Hubbard back in April of 2008. She said constituents in her district had expressed some interest, so the parish wanted to see if the rest of St. John would be on board. The parish-wide poll is a result of several meetings with council members, service providers, and administration officials.

Boe said funding for the program would be taken from the beautification fund, which is within the budget of the department of economic development. If the pilot program is successful, a budgetary line item for “recycling” will be created in the 2009 parish budget. He said that residents would be polled again in November before making the program permanent.

“This effort will showcase St. John as being green, environmentally friendly, and moving forward in a progressive manner,” said Boe.”