Recycling is one of those necessary evils. It can be tedious to sort through everything, but in the end, you're saving the environment — usually — so it's worth it. But it's not worth it when you're getting fined $200 because you threw a can of soda into the wrong container. Yes, that actually happened.

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The Examiner looked at some high fines for low-grade offenses, and found that the trash inspectors are ignoring the recycling law, which allows for fines only if a trash receptacle has more than 30 percent of recyclable materials. Councilman Jack Evans, of Ward 2, said the Department of Public Works "can't be overzealous"; the DPW says it isn't.

Maybe this is the District's way of making up for that budget gap?