The Bloomberg Era: Flashy Initiatives, Little Followthrough

Apparently the mayor’s ambitious GreeNYC plan — the initiative that, among other things, encourages office workers to be more environmentally aware by “re-purposing used sheets into scrap paper” or “shredding it to serve as packing material” — the initiative so efficient that it actually uses fewer “Ns”! — was just window dressing, as thousands of pounds of recycling is set to be discarded on Broadway:

For seven years, legal secretary Joanie Kissell has been collecting hole punchings at her job at Kenyon & Kenyon along the Canyon of Heroes.

The 58-year-old from Queens began gathering the little bits of paper even before she scored a job at a firm on the parade route.

Co-workers thought she was crazy. She says she was optimistic.

“They think I’m nuts,” Kissell said. “I’d say to them, ‘Wait! Don’t throw that out!'”

They’ll be grateful today when they can all look to her jar labeled “New York Yankees. 2009” to join in showering paper onto the Yankees to celebrate their 27th world championship.

. . .

At the Downtown Alliance’s transportation division, sanitation workers were busy yesterday bagging up a half-ton of shredded paper donated by a Red Hook recycling facility.

They planned to drop off about 400 bags of the stuff at buildings along Broadway between 4a.m. and 5 a.m. on Friday.