From Catherine over at The Decatur Minute…

he City of Decatur Public Works Sanitation Division is working to resolve an issue with a defective Pay-As-You-Throw bag shipment from the bag manufacturer. It appears that the problem is isolated to the green, 8-gallon bags. We apologize for any inconvenience this has caused. If you have received defective bags please return them to the retail store where they were purchased in order to receive replacement bags. You may also take the defective bags to the Public Works Office at 2635 Talley Street in Decatur and receive replacement bags. We are checking the bag inventory to ensure that defective bags are not delivered to the retail stores.

If you have any questions, please call David Junger, Assistant City Manager, at 404-377-5571 or email david.junger@decaturga.com .

Watch out Public Works.  Andisheh’s brainstorming…

I love the concept and the result of Decatur’s pay-as-you-throw residential garbage system. I have some problems with the practice, however.

Of the three available garbage bag sizes, none fits the trash can in my kitchen. As a result, our household garbage typically gets disposed of in two bags – we take the plastic bag from the kitchen and dump it in one of the bigger Decatur bags.

It’s wasteful to double-bag garbage. I’m wondering if there isn’t a solution.

a) Maybe Decatur could expand its range of garbage bags to include the most popular sizes.

b) Better yet, Decatur could get out of the trash bag business and get into the trash bag stamp business. Let us use our own trash bags, but pay for their pickup by affixing stamps to them. We have an eight gallon can in our kitchen. How hard could it be to develop a system that lets residents purchase eight, 10, 13 or 35 gallon stamps to affix to bags or cans. Just sell the stamps in 10, five, two and one gallon denominations.

And if people want to stick with the current system, why not keep it, too.

I’m sure there’s a downside, but I thought I’d throw it out there.

Thought of this question while I was putting out my trash this week:

How many adults/kids live in your house and how many Pay-As-You Throw garbage bags do you put out on average each week?

Just curious how my trash output compares to my neighbors.

My answer is 2 adults/1 dog, one yellow bag.

Feel free to elaborate.  I have a feeling there will be quite a few pre-kid/post-kid laments.