A retired civil rights attorney spreads the word in Lake Maggiore: It’s righteous to recycle.
By Anna Sowa
Stuffed in a muggy living room before 11 tired-looking church leaders, Ed Helm hopes he is preaching to the choir.
He shouts above an overworked fan wedged into an open window.
“We are the stewards of God’s creation,” says Helm, a 60-year-old retired civil rights attorney. He explains how separating recyclables from garbage is part of God’s plan — a moral duty to protect the Earth.
Helm is taking his mission to moral leaders. He says churches are the most influential force in the mostly black Lake Maggiore area in St. Petersburg, Fla., so reaching this community means first reaching the pastors.
“We need power, and that’s where the power is,” Helm says.
But Helm’s message may be falling on deaf ears. He is trying to reach an audience that, in the Lake Maggiore neighborhood, is already dealing with a litany of social issues like unemployment, education and poverty.
St. Petersburg has dismal recycling rates — 50 percent of all waste is recyclable, according to Pinellas County Utilities. The City Council this month voted 7-1 against even discussing a curbside recycling program. Now, with local government uninterested, Helm and fellow members of the First Progressive Club of St. Petersburg are trying to reach a new crowd: churchgoers.
“If our city doesn’t do it, we need to come together as a community,” Helm says, “so we can begin to understand where all our waste goes and how much of that goes into the incinerator.”
The sultry room could be an incinerator. Two miniature golden crucifixes hang opposite Helms on the once-white walls of the Interdenominational Ministerial Alliance headquarters, an association of pastors from black churches, on 2900 First Ave. S. Sunburned plaster peels off the ceiling as Helm continues.
“This is faith stuff,” he says to the crowd of church leaders and pastors.
Reaching the religious community is crucial for Helm, but it also could be the hardest to reach. A quick, informal survey of 20 residents at the Boyd Hill Nature Park along the shores of Lake Maggiore found only five who regularly recycle. A comprehensive survey by the city showed that 66 percent of residents throw recyclables into the garbage. In the Lake Maggiore area, anecdotal evidence suggests even fewer residents recycle.
“I have too many other problems to worry about than recycling,” says Lisa Holmes, a single mother who lives in the neighborhood. She was recently fired from her retail job after sustaining a back injury. “It’s not high on the priorities list.”
Things that top that list: taking care of her family, getting an education, finding a job and limiting her teenage son’s telephone time.
Major Walters, who lives in the neighborhood, also has other things to do with his time than recycle. Among his favorites: golf and fishing. He says no amount of debating will inspire him to recycle.
“I don’t do it, my friends don’t do it and my family doesn’t do it,” Walters says. “It’s an inconvenience and I just ain’t got the time.”
Helm is undaunted. He believes that churches are the key to convincing people in poverty-stricken areas like around Lake Maggiore to sort their trash and haul it off to recycling centers.
Two weeks after the alliance meeting, Helm gathered another 22 people for a curbside recycling discussion at the St. Petersburg South Branch Library, where he proselytized the link between religion and the environment. Some audience members said they supported using religious references, like stewardship of the land, to promote environmentalism. Others worried that using religion as a vehicle for such issues alienates nonreligious residents.
Gustav Victor, alliance president and Church of God pastor in Wauchula, Fla., is one of the pastors supporting Helm. He says although some churches encourage recycling from the pulpit and distribute recycling information, few residents care.
“People are more concerned about jobs in the low-income areas,” he says. “There is so much going on in the neighborhood at the present time, it’s not a top priority.”
Improving public schools, fighting racial discrimination, curbing area violence and upgrading sidewalks are more urgent than sorting, hauling and dumping trash at local recycling centers.
But Willie Bryant, a lifelong member of Moores Chapel African Methodist Episcopal Church on 3037 Fairfield Ave. S, believes environmental issues should be a main concern for the faithful.
“You gotta respect yourself and your community,” says Bryant, a trustee for the church. “If you want to keep your house clean, you have to take (recyclables) to the dump. It’s up to the individuals.”
And that may be Helms’ biggest challenge. Because he has to convert people to recycling one by one. Take Isaac Holmes and his niece, Lisa Holmes. They live in the same neighborhood and come from the same family. But Isaac and Lisa have different priorities.
He recycles. She doesn’t.
He’s worried about keeping garbage off the streets.
She’s worried about getting a job.
He looks 20 years down the road. He hopes his children will grow up with clean air, water and land.
She looks to the end of the month. She hopes she can afford to put gas in the car.
He takes the time to separate cans of paint and wood stains, saving some for later and recycling the rest, trading them for money.
She says she has more important things to worry about than how to sort glass and plastic. She must feed her family. And once she pays a bill, she’ll drop the old envelope straight into the trash — thinking more about where that money will come from than where the garbage will go.
