Mississippi Requires County Recycling Plans With 25% Waste-Reduction Goal

Under the Nonhazardous Solid Waste Planning Act of 1991, Section 17-17-227 orders each county, in cooperation with its municipalities, to prepare, adopt and submit a local plan to the Mississippi Commission on Environmental Quality for review. The plan must, at a minimum, include a strategy for hitting a twenty-five percent waste-reduction goal through source reduction, recycling or other waste-reduction technologies, alongside waste inventories and twenty-year generation projections. The Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality administers the program and keeps copies on file. The 25% target drives local recycling and composting efforts statewide; there is no curbside-recycling mandate on individual residents.

A county that fails to adopt or implement an approved plan falls out of compliance with the Commission on Environmental Quality, which can withhold plan approval and block permits for new solid waste facilities in the county.