SPRINGFIELD - In his 18 years of running a recycling program, Joe Stepping has learned two valuable lessons.

"It has to be convenient and it has to be free," said Stepping, recycling director in Christian County.

Of the 102 counties in Illinois, Christian County has the highest reported percentage of waste recycled, according to the 2007 Landfill Capacity Report issued by the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency.

"We have a hard time keeping up with people," said Stepping, whose county recycles 68.5 percent of its waste. "We have a site in Taylorville that is picked up three times a week."

Among Central Illinois counties, McLean has the highest recycle rate - more than 36 percent, according to the EPA report.

In Christian County, the main factor for the high percentage is the number of people living there, Stepping said.

"Our percentage is higher than (other counties) probably because our population is smaller," he said.

Christian County, which has about 35,000 residents, uses a drop-off program rather than curbside pickup. Blue recycling bins are scattered across the county as drop-off points. However, cardboard and plastics recycled from businesses makes up a majority of the waste, Stepping said.

"There just wasn't enough people to justify doing (curbside pickup)," Stepping said. "Our drop-off program has grown dramatically since we started it."

Each county in Illinois is responsible for submitting its own recycling data to the EPA, said Ellen Robinson of the agency's land bureau, noting the system can cause headaches because not all counties keep track of the information regularly.

The Illinois EPA compiles the information supplied from each county to form its annual report. The percentage recycled is based off a mathematical formula.

Chicago gathers its own information and ranks second in the state behind Christian County at 55.4 percent of its waste recycled. Tazewell and Macon are around 30 percent.

Unlike some northern parts of the state, southern Illinois scores are not as high. The region overall has the lowest percentage of waste recycled in the state. However, Jackson County is better at 21.5 percent.

"It's not as convenient for them to manage their solid waste," said Maggie Carson, EPA spokeswoman. "Even the act of recycling may be more difficult because they don't have a convenient place to take it."

She added some southern Illinois communities haul some waste to Missouri because it's cheaper.

Counties in the eastern part of the state hovered around or below 10 percent. Coles County recycled 10.6 percent of its waste. Woodford and Ford counties were even lower, at 2.9 and 1.6 percent respectively, according to the report

Across the state, Illinoisans recycles more than nine million tons of waste annually, but generates more than 23 million tons, according to the report.

Christian has it all

There are three main factors that determine how much a county recycles: money, population and dedication, Robinson said. Christian County has all three.

"They have the Cadillac of programs," she said. "They teach little kids how to do it and they go home and teach the parent."

Christian County benefits from money it collects from the Five Oaks landfill in Taylorville. Stepping said about $250,000 is generated, an amount that pays for the recycling drop-off program and allows a full time staff.

Other counties don't have that luxury and rely on money collected from property taxes or the state.

"Look where the landfills (there are 45 in Illinois) are and that will tell you where the good programs are," Robinson said.

Recycling is not as hot an issue in Illinois as it was in the late 1980s and early 1990s, Robinson said. In 1992, state lawmakers approved legislation calling on counties to reach a 25 percent plateau in five years for recycled material.

More than half have fallen short of that goal.

"It became an unfunded mandate for these people to do this," Robinson said of the Solid Waste Planning and Recycling Act, adding it contains loopholes for counties to avoid reaching the goal.

But how much a county recycles may be as simple as who is running the show.

"If you have the right person in the job, they're going to do a lot more to encourage people to recycle," Robinson said.

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Waste recycling

Chart shows the amount of waste collected and recycled in several Central Illinois counties.

…Population of county…Tons of waste…Tons recycled…Percentage recycled

McLean …164,209…257,669…93,568…36.3

Macon…114,706…137,919…42,152…30.6

Tazewell …128,521…148,936…44,020…29.6

Logan… 31,383…20,500…5,000…24.4

Livingston… 39,678…46,344…9,000…19.4

DeWitt…16,516 …11,303…999…8.8

Piatt…16,720…8,960…520…5.8

Woodford …36,967… 41,153…1,200…2.9

Ford…14,049… 6,289…100…1.6