This Model Resolution for Zero Waste can be adapted to local conditions and passed by local governments and community organizations. See also our Resolution for Producer Responsibility for Waste. Please let us know of your progress so we can post news on this site.
Resolution for Zero Waste
WHEREAS
- The placement of materials in waste disposal facilities, such as landfills and incinerators, causes damage to human health, wastes natural resources and/or wrongly transfers liabilities to future generations, and
- The elimination of specified types of waste for disposal, also known as disposal bans, will protect states from waste importation from other states and nations, and
- Consumers are currently forced to assume the high financial cost of collecting, recycling, and disposing of materials, and
- Tax subsidies for waste and virgin materials send the wrong economic signals to both consumers and producers, and
- A resource recovery based economy will create and sustain more productive and meaningful jobs, and
- Increasingly, U.S. and international governments and organizations are adopting the policy that the financial responsibility of collecting, recycling, and disposing of materials belongs with producers, and
- Producers should design products to ensure that they can be safely recycled back into the marketplace or nature, and
- Most types of waste streams can be easily eliminated through across-the-board minimum recycling content laws, the use of non-toxic alternatives in product design, and local composting facilities, and
- Recognizing that some materials are necessary for the public health and national security, in which case, storage is the only safe alternative, and
- Recognizing that voluntary recycling goals have not achieved waste elimination, and
- Government is ultimately responsible for establishing criteria needed to eliminate waste, so that manufacturers produce and businesses sell materials that can be safely recycled or composted,
THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED THAT
[City/ County/ Organization] supports the creation of a Zero Waste Plan in order to eliminate waste and pollution in the manufacture, use, storage, and recycling of materials.