San Francisco's scavengers: a story of gangs, poverty and recycling.

HAIGHT-Ashbury (San Francisco, Calif.); SAN Francisco (Calif.); CALIFORNIA

The article looks at the scavenger recycling culture in San Francisco, California. Poor and homeless people have taken advantage of the bottle bill provision of the California Beverage Container Recycling and Litter Reduction to gain income through collecting beverage containers for redemption at the Haight Ashbury Neighbourhood Centre (HANC). As the U.S. economic crisis worsened, middle class and retired individuals, as well as organized gangs, took up scavenging. After San Francisco's waste management company, Recology, complained of financial losses due to scavenging, San Francisco mayor Gavin Newsom ordered an eviction notice for the HANC, prompting charges that the move constituted class warfare.