Sanchez questions Anderson on additional city-owned land for composting beyond Rikers

Speaking of composting, given that you mentioned Rikers and the opportunity for composting there, I wanted to know, are there any other islands

or city-owned land that you or the department are looking at for potential spots for composting as well?

We're certainly always looking for potential locations for new compost facilities.

I think the challenge with a lot of the rest of New York City is that we are competing against other potential uses for city-owned property or even for privately owned property.

And in many cases, there are better uses.

Housing, for example, is a better use for much of the city's land than compost facilities.

So I think that's why we've really zeroed in on Rikers Island, because it's not really appropriate for residential development.

It's a very large place.

It's physically separated from other neighborhoods.

And so it's sort of ripe for that kind of industrial use.

We're also always...

Looking at this as a regional issue, because there is a substantial amount of property outside of New York City that may be a better use for or location for a compost facility.

So we're always in conversations with the private industry around potential development of new sites that could take New York City material.

Is there any...

like discussion about like some of the smaller islands and just turning into a compost island, like a brother, a brother island or, you know, any of those smaller places that, you know, are not.

Many of the other islands are either protected as either, you know, environmental,

like conservation habitats or their property of the federal government or there are other kinds of restrictions on their use.

And so there's complications with everything.

But if you have ideas, we're certainly happy to look at them.

Great.