The city of Phoenix introduced a new incentive following the November elections to help clear the Valley’s street corners and roadways from campaign signs with a free recycling program.
Now that elections are over and there is no use for campaign signs, people can drop off the signs, usually made out of plastic and reinforcing metal, at three transfer stations in the Valley. Transfer stations sort waste, recycle material and ship the rest to landfills, said Stephanie Ribodal Romero, a public information officer with the city of Phoenix.
The recycling has not cost the city or taxpayers additional money, Ribodal Romero said. It is already incorporated into the city’s recycling costs.
“This is the first year we said, ‘Hey, we should do something like this,'” she said.
It is up to each individual candidates to play nice and clean up after themselves, she said.
This year, the deadline for candidates to remove campaign signs was Nov. 21, according to a press release from the city. While the signs should have already been taken down, the city does not fine those who leave their signs past the deadline and does not have staff members who are responsible for cleaning them up, said Sina Matthes, a public information officer with the Planning and Development Department.
“Depending on how many complaints we get, we may or may not go out and pick them up ourselves,” Ribodal Romero said.
State Rep. Katie Hobbs, who was elected to the state Senate in this election, said her campaign has collected many of the 100-150 signs they put up and will repurpose all of them.
“We keep track of where they are located and then we get them after the campaign is over,” Hobbs said.
Signs are never wasted, she said. They will be reused for reelection in the future or sold to other candidates who are running. Those that cannot be reused will be recycled for free with the new city initiative.
Though signs clutter corners, Joaquin Rios, research director at the Arizona Democratic Party, and Hobbs both said they are necessary.
“It is kind of this part of American politics,” Hobbs said. “If you don’t have signs up, people think you don’t exist.”
Rios said every campaign he worked on analyzed sign placement based on street traffic and kept a spreadsheet with sign locations. This helped to locate and collect the signs after the election was over.
The recycling initiative helps both the city and the candidates, said Terry Gellenbeck, a spokesman with the city of Phoenix Public Works Department. All of the signs are sorted with other mixed rigid plastics and are bundled and sold by the city. The free recycling saves the candidates money, as well.
Gellenbeck said the city does not have comprehensive data on how many tons of political signs were recycled in the past, but said the department will collect data for 2012.
Any remaining campaign signs can be taken to the three transfer stations, 27th Avenue Transfer Station at 3060 S. 27th Avenue, North Gateway Transfer Station at 30205 N. Black Canyon Highway and Re Community at 1919 E. University Drive, according to the press release. Smaller materials can be placed in a regular blue barrel for recycling.
Contact the reporter at domenico.nicosia@asu.edu
