Residents have been complaining for years about bottle & can scavengers that regularly trespass onto private property. It's not a harmless act. JPCA president Bob Holden had an encounter with two individuals who pretended to be bottle collectors but turned out to be a burglary team with long arrest records. Nobody should look the other way when someone trespasses onto your property.

After watching the HBO Documentary Redemption about the lives of these collectors we can't help but remark that this is such a waste of human energy. Many are just trying to make a living but why not put their energies to better use? Most people would still be willing to pay the 5 cent deposit if it meant cleaner streets.

The City could hire them for say $10 an hour to clean the streets of the 5 Boroughs. Of course the State of New York would have to eliminate the 5cent deposit (we already have bottle & can recycling) but the customer would still pay the extra nickel on the bottle/can to fund the program. The result would be that bottle collectors would now have a real job, pay taxes, contribute to their social security and the public would have cleaner streets and homeowners would not have to deal with strangers trespassing onto their property. It sounds like a win-win-win plan.