The city should trash the rotten composting mandate

Mandatory composting in New York City is a garbage idea that somehow keeps getting recycled even though it trashes New Yorkers’ daily lives.

On Thursday, members of the City Council’s Common Sense Caucus introduced legislation to kill the current fines for failing to separate food scraps from regular garbage.

Mayor Eric Adams announced the rule in 2023 as part of his war on rats, but the city only started doling out fines this month; in just the first 10 days the Sanitation Department slammed property owners with nearly 2,500 tickets.

Yet the rule’s not central to starving out rodents: The city’s already made landlords buy new, more secure $50 bins and limited the hours trash can sit on the street, giving vermin little time to try to feed from containers the city insists are “rat proof.”

No: This is more about greens’ faith in composting as a way to cut greenhouse-gas and the belief among “sanitation experts” that it can save the city big-time by reducing the waste that goes to landfills.

Mayor Michael Bloomberg tried it. Mayor Bill de Blasio tried it. Both failed.

One reason: Collecting and processing organic material is expensive, more than three times the cost of regular garbage and recycling, as of 2019.

Adams’ minions claims the new composting program is significantly cheaper for the city than past plans, but that still leaves the burdens on landlords and tenants.

Specifically: Managing yet another trash flow (on top of recyclable paper, metal and glass) costs time, energy and space — the last of which is in particularly short supply in New York apartment kitchens.

Already, building supers get stuck spending trash day shoulder-deep in a garbage bag trying to fish out pizza boxes.

In 2022, New Yorkers recycled only about 17% of their waste, far below the 50% estimated if everyone perfectly sorted their trash.

Composting is even more of a hassle. Exactly how much of our own resources does city government expect New Yorkers to spend on managing garbage?

Suburbanites and rural folks may find it a worthwhile hobby but it’s a nonstarter for city slickers.

This is a mandate for more supers dumpster-diving, more landlords getting slammed with fees they can’t afford and more frustrated renters — not fewer rats.

Give people the option to compost, fine; forcing the entire city to compost is unrealistic, punitive nanny-statism at its worst.

Bin the rotten compost mandate now.