Sliding under most people’s radar in October of 2021, the Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection issued its 2030 Solid Waste Master Plan, seeking to reduce disposal by 30%, while also setting a long-term goal of a 90% reduction by 2050.

On November 1^st of this year, a textile ban went into effect prohibiting the disposal of bedding, clothing, curtains, fabric, footwear, towels and similar items. They joined a previously prohibited list of items that included glass, metal, plastic containers, paper, cardboard, leaves, grass, large appliances, tires, old televisions and computer monitors, and constructions materials. Additional restrictions were also placed on commercial food waste, and you can bet your bottom barrel they’re going to keep tabs on your discarded chicken wing bones at home, too. (page 19 of the Master Plan)

So what exactly are we allowed to throw in the trash these days? And who the hell really wants the stuff we’re no longer going to be allowed to discard?

You think bows around the giant plastic bags the Mrs. and I drop off at the trailer on Chelmsford Street will make up for the disappointment of unwrapping the “charitable gift” of my old boxers and grimy socks with holes in them?

How about old produce or expired meats? Should I just toss them in the backyard for the animals to feed, or can anyone recommend a pantry or shelter where they’ll season them, army chef Frank Costanza style, to the point the rotten stench is disguised? Maybe that shelter would also appreciate my wife’s half-eaten Bolognese that’s still sitting in the fridge from last Thursday’s date night.

The fact is, no matter how well-intentioned recycling measures are, trash is trash. It needs to be disposed of, buried, burned, and/or placed on a SpaceX rocket and shipped outside earth’s atmosphere. Otherwise, it piles up and creates problems and health hazards for people, particularly those who live in cities like Lowell.

REUTERS/Joe Skipper

Perhaps in the toney suburbs, there are elites who toss perfectly good clothing because the latest fashion trend made it obsolete before the store tags were even removed. But where I come from, the Acre, we wore our clothes till the holes and tears in them could no longer be hidden. I would imagine most folks raising families in three-story buildings and tenements are in the same boat.

Please spare us the lecture about the wonderful cleaning rags grandma’s flannel nighties will make. Nobody should have to build an addition to their home to store a decade of accumulated “cleaning rags” because Karen from Carlisle got the bright idea she’s saving the planet while driving the kids to Lacrosse practice in her Mercedes SUV.

And therein lies the biggest issue I have with these poorly thought-out measures; the elites who create and enact them never really have to deal with the unintended consequences. The rest of the world, especially those on lower rungs of the financial ladder, are the ones who pay the price…literally.

Photo Courtesy Jesse Costa/WBUR

In the more affluent burbs, worst-case scenario is some overzealous town employee drawing a taxpayer funded paycheck picks through the trash on your sidewalk or driveway, finds a tattered Taylor Swift t-shirt, and levies a fine you’ll likely consider nothing more than a cost of doing business in this game called life.

In working class cities like Lowell, there won’t be as much political appetite to fine the single mother raising three kids for tossing her worn-out work sneakers into the garbage bin. Don’t worry, though. She, and you, will simply pay more through increased taxes and fees caused by your discarded Patriots hoodie.

If you think I’m exaggerating, check out your City Council agenda this Tuesday night. Specifically, Motion 11.1;

C. Gitschier – Req. City Mgr. Have The Proper Department Report on The Recycling Contamination Rate by Month Over The Last Three Years And Cost To The Taxpayer.

What Councilor Gitschier is getting at is how much extra the city pays for solid waste and recycling not properly disposed of, creating “contamination” as it’s known in the industry. The more contamination, the more the city pays to dispose of its trash and recycling. Can’t blame the Councilor or anyone else for wanting to limit those costs. It’s their job.

Problem is, the way to reduce the contamination rate and corresponding price tag is to get residents to do dispose of things “properly,” whether that’s through use of the carrot (education) or the stick (fines).

Well, the do-gooders in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts just did something bad for residents of communities like Lowell. They handed government a big stick and lots of incentive to use it against them. Or to do the more compassionate thing and just “spread the wealth” by taxing all of us more to cover it.

Take it from someone with experience on the receiving end, Lowellians; add a few more layers of textiles to your daily attire. It will delay your tossing them in the trash and it eases the sting of getting whacked with the stick.