A little more than 20 years ago, the New York City Department of Sanitation was in the throes of establishing its recycling program. Today, according to the DSNY, it's the world's largest, picking up 12,000 tons of refuse and recyclables each day.

That remarkable evolution came about in no small measure because of Columbia University 's own off-campus residential building recycling that pre-dated the city's earliest efforts and provided lots of data the city needed to move ahead.

In the early to mid-80's, Columbia 's off-campus residences had been recycling paper in collaboration with about six "little grassroots organizations," says Mark Kerman, Assistant Vice President for Residential and Commercial Operations. "The city knew we were doing this and figured we'd be receptive, so they asked us to go into a pilot program."

Residents from 30 to 40 buildings - about a third of Columbia 's then off-campus portfolio - participated. Some buildings with alleys were given rolling bins to use for paper storage, while in buildings without alleys, building staff collected paper from participants and tied it before they brought it to the street for collection.

In 1986, the city started picking up the paper once a week, and in some cases building staff would carry the papers down the block to the pick-up location. Kerman says that DSNY used the data on the amounts of paper collected as a gauge to measure the impact of the program and to estimate the volume of paper that might be collected when the program became city-wide. He says he doesn't recall any other university having been involved in this pilot program.

Superintendent Myra Martino, who arrived at 530 Riverside Drive in July 1986, says she remembers that hers was one of the pioneer buildings for recycling. Martino says residents of the 54 apartments recycled about 20 tons of paper in the first year.

Today, visitors to the Trash Room in the building's immaculately cared-for basement can see an original disposal bin intended for plastic bottles as well as a wrought iron container in which paper was stacked and tied for recycling.

And in the alley beside the 324-unit building at 400 W. 119^th St., there's one of the original 3-cubic-yard paper containers that's still rolled out to the street and emptied by a special DSNY truck.

Karl Jones, who has worked at the 119^th St. building since 1969 and has been the superintendent for the past four years, says they've been sorting and recycling there since about 1974. Jones says longtime superintendent Arthur Wemer, who died about two years ago, came up with the idea "long before DSNY started recycling pickups and it really worked out.

"After recycling was required here in the city, we were way ahead of the game."

Later, as the city was trying to expand recycling to include plastic bottles and encountered some delays, Martino tells a story that's a poignant footnote to Columbia 's recycling history.

Because of the city's hold up in collecting plastic bottles, Martino says 530 Riverside found itself overwhelmed with them. One day a homeless woman came by and asked if she could have the bags of bottles. She began making weekly pickups, eventually earning enough from cashing in the bottles to rent a storage room. The woman then organized a coop of sorts, comprising other homeless people who collected plastic bottles from across the city.

Martino says the woman eventually returned to tell her she'd made enough to rent a small apartment, get an office job and restart her life.

Kerman says Columbia is proud to have played a part in developing one of the country's premier municipal recycling programs, due in large measure to the many years of cooperation by building residents. Moreover, he says, Residential and Commercial Operations remains eager to find new ways of partnership between residents and DSNY.