New Orleans officials are surrendering a $4 million federal grant to expand curbside recycling services to all households, saying they anticipate additional costs in connection with the program that the city simply cannot afford. 

The program was initially seen as an effective way to address meager recycling rates in New Orleans, where only 2% of household waste is recycled — an extraordinarily low number. But the city’s budget crisis has made accepting the grant unwise, said City Council President JP Morrell. 

Former employees in the city’s Office of Resilience and Sustainability who were working to set up the program before being laid off in January argue that relinquishing the money is a mistake, calling it a missed opportunity to finally make a dent in New Orleans’ recycling problem.

Morrell says following through with the grant may have left the city on the hook for expenses related to new bins. He also said he was concerned that the program would actually result in more trash, with residents using the new bins as an additional garbage can, complicating haulers’ work.

“When I look at anything that is brought before me, personally as a council person, and there is any possibility that there could be an unforeseen price tag at the end, I have to pause,” he said. “There’s no such thing as free money or free lunch, period.”

Morrell’s legislative director, Julia Zuckerman, told city officials in a Feb. 10 email to employees in the resilience office and sanitation department that “we cannot afford to move forward on the EPA grant.”

One small portion of the grant that could end up being used involves spending $350,000 on a 10-year solid waste master plan. In a letter sent to the project’s EPA grant officer Feb. 27, Meagan Williams, the city’s chief sustainability officer, asked the EPA for an extension to carry out only the solid waste plan. 

“At this time, the city does not intend to pursue the remaining scope of work due to the city’s budget deficit and uncertainty on whether the city will be able to sustain its current curbside recycling program,” Williams said. 

Chris Lang, among those fired from the city’s climate office as part of budget cuts in January, said the grant essentially provided free money to expand recycling to all households. The $3.9 million from the EPA plus an additional $1.4 million from a nonprofit group to educate residents about recycling would not require additional funding from the city, he stressed. 

“It didn’t have to be this complicated,” Lang said.

The EPA grant must be spent by the end of March, and a council hearing on the project has been deferred for months, effectively relinquishing the money. Even though the federal government awarded the city the funds, the climate office still needs council approval of a contract with the cart company.

Morrell said that another council member could hold the hearing “if they want to roll the dice on this,” but that no one else was lining up to take on the challenge. Mayor Helena Moreno’s office did not respond to a request for comment. 

Saving money or creating more trash? 

New Orleans’ 2% rate is a fraction of the national average of 30% for recycled and composted materials. In Houston, around a third is recycled. Top recycling cities in southern California boast rates over 70%.

Less than half of New Orleans households, or 42%, participate in the city’s opt-in program as of 2025. Residents must call 311 to request a free recycling cart delivered to their home.

The grant would have allowed the city to deliver carts to all homes without the need for a request, along with public outreach and information.

All residents pay for both trash and recycling pickups as part of the monthly sanitation fee even if they don’t use the service. The existing sanitation fee is not enough to cover the full cost of the overall service, putting the city at a deficit.

Moreno, in a recent interview with WWL Louisiana, mentioned the possibility of raising garbage fees and possibly nixing curbside recycling altogether, which she said would save the city $12 million per year.

Morrell said the grant left budgetary questions unanswered, such as obligations for replacing the blue carts if they fall apart and whether the city would be required to continually replace the carts to stay in compliance. He also thought the recycling program could inadvertently create more trash.

“If I look at my own neighborhood, my own community, actual proper recycling is the exception, not the rule,” Morrell said. “A lot of those cans are just additional trash cans.”

Sidney Torres, whose hauling company IV Waste services the largest number of New Orleans households, raised similar concerns that the project would create more trash at the landfill. Torres noted that between 20% and 30% of the material thrown in recycling bins is not actually recyclable. 

Another issue is a lack of processing capacity at the primary recycling facility in Harahan, which Torres said often forces haulers to drive to Baton Rouge for drop-offs. Encouraging more people to sign up for recycling carts through the current system ultimately works better than the proposed alternative, which would end up costing the city more money in the end, he said.

“The last thing that people are going to want to do is be forced to recycle,” Torres said. “They’re just going to use it for garbage and it’s going to fall on the contractors to have to deal with that.”

Alvin Richard, who owns the garbage hauling company Richard’s Disposal, said that the cost to the city would actually decrease due to less material going to the landfill. But he said the program would bring “a tremendous cost to the operators.” 

“The cost would change from the city to us,” Richard said. 

‘Unprecedented opportunity’

City officials last fall, before Moreno took office, disputed some of the worries over the grant.

Greg Nichols, who led the climate office until the January layoffs, said in September that the program could divert up to 30,000 tons of waste from the landfill by 2030.

Department of Sanitation Director Matt Torri called the grant a “rare and unprecedented opportunity” for the city during the September committee meeting. He also said that the program would save the city money because every ton diverted from the landfill amounts to $35 saved in tipping fees, or the charge for dropping off the waste.

Lang added that educating the public about recycling was a key component of the grant, and it included a FAQ accompanying the new carts, community outreach events, social media information and an in-person program for new recyclers.

The issue is garnering attention online, with over 800 signatures as of Tuesday on a petition, started by Lang, to use the grant. 

Lang said he understood why the waste haulers have concerns about the program. They pay processing fees at the recycling facility, he said, adding that under their contracts with the city, they’re paid the same to provide the service no matter how many residents actually recycle.

“They’re basically getting paid 100% of the value to do 42% of the work,” Lang said. “Because of this, they have no incentive to increase recycling participation in any meaningful way.” 

In a letter sent to council members last fall, a lawyer representing Torres said that IV Waste “fully supports recycling” but that a mass distribution of up to 80,000 more carts “would overwhelm contractors.”

Richard noted that the waste haulers’ contracts with the city have been in place over the last few years, and that the agreements were established under the current 311 system. 

“Everybody bid their recycling at a low cost because there wasn’t that much to do,” Richard said.Â