Bureau of Sanitation Open House

Last Saturday, we celebrated the great work of the City's Department of Public Works at the Bureau of Sanitation's Open House. The Open House, which had a great turnout, was held at the West Los Angeles District Yard.

As the chair of our city's Public Works Committee, I would like to thank the employees within this bureau for their public service and commitment to keeping our city beautiful.

For those of you who don't know, the Bureau of Sanitation is one of five bureaus within the Department of Public Works. The Bureau carries out its responsibilities by the management and administration of three primary programs:
- Wastewater collection, conveyance, treatment, and disposal
- Solid resources collection, recycling and disposal
- Watershed protection

Through the City's Keep Los Angeles Beautiful program, the City partners with neighborhood and community groups to increase litter prevention, waste reduction, recycling, tree planting and other beautification efforts citywide. From beach clean-ups to tree-planting events, countless volunteers spend their free time keeping our neighborhoods beautiful and clean.

I encourage all of you to take advantage of the many programs offered by the Bureau of Sanitation:

Ø Utilize the new multi-family unit recycling program, which provides recycling services for apartment buildings with five or more units. This new program will have over 100,000 residential units online by the end of this year. It is free to landlords and their tenants; landlords just need to call to enroll in the program.
Ø All plastics AND polystyrene (Styrofoam) are now accepted in LA's blue bins. The Styrofoam must be clean (no food waste attached)
Ø Utilize the bulky item pick-up service to have a City crew pick up discarded furniture and other debris that will not fit in your curbside bin
Ø Tour the Hyperion treatment plant, which is located in the 11th district and learn more about our city's wastewater collection and treatment system
Ø Get free mulch for your garden and yard
Ø Attend the Bureau of Sanitation composting fairs to learn more about how to recycle food waste and yard waste in your own backyard
Ø Participate in the City's Solid Waste Integrated Resource Plan (SWIRP) stakeholder process to develop a long range plan to make LA a zero waste city

Get more info about these and other Bureau of Sanitation services at http://www.lacity.org/SAN/index.htm.

-Bill