The purpose of the organization involves educating the legislators, law enforcement and other stakeholders that the industry is not to blame for the metal theft problem, and as a major stakeholder, can play an important part of the solution to reducing metal theft through cooperative efforts with other stakeholders and policy makers.

The association also encourages active involvement of the membership to be involved in their respective regions of Tennessee – working with law enforcement, prosecutors, legislators and others to communicate and address the issue of metal theft. The founding members felt it was critical that a unified industry become organized to address these issues and to better educate themselves and others in Tennessee about metal theft and other issues relevant to the scrap recycling industry.

The association retains the services of a Nashville based lobbying firm to represent their interests at the state legislative and regulatory level.

Participation from recyclers large and small and from the large cities as well as the rural areas of the state are critical to the continued success of the TSRA.

Through this organization, it is the intent to educate, communicate, network and support each other on the issues that are critical to their continued success in Tennessee.

While metal theft is currently the subject that is getting most of the attention – the TSRA will be handling much more than metals theft and issues for metal recyclers. We will be monitoring issues of importance to recyclers of metals, paper, plastic, glass, textiles, rubber, and electronics. TSRA will be engaged in legislative and regulatory issues beyond just metal theft. Future issues could include solid waste/government sponsored recycling, container deposit legislation, storm water regulations (growing hot topic around the country), “flow control” and others.