The City of North Battleford's plans to change over to a new biweekly garbage and recycling regime is still being met with some resistance in the community.
One local resident, Amie Kauth, wrote a letter to city council relaying her concerns about the new pickup schedule, the new rollout garbage and recycling bins, and the costs involved. The correspondence was received by council at Monday's meeting.
A number of councillors responded to the letter by email. Councillor Greg Lightfoot said he personally contacted the letter writer to appease her issues and concerns as much as possible.
"I told her we would be monitoring this to make sure it would work properly," said Lightfoot.
Councillor Cathy Richardson said her response was along the same lines, but also encouraged her to attend the open house information session at the Don Ross Centre. The final open house meeting on the new garbage and recycling program was slated for April 17 between 5 and 8 p.m. at Room 107, Don Ross Centre.
Councillor Ryan Bater adds that part of the message the city wants to convey is that council "wants to be adaptive and responsive to the concerns of the public. This is something new for the city, and by extension, new for us, too."
City Manager Jim Puffalt echoed that sentiment. He called the new biweekly regime a "tremendous program," and adds "recycling is basically thrown in - you're paying the same price, you're getting recycling to your door, so that's an incredible benefit for the majority of the community."
"It's a very great program that council's put together. We want to make sure that we're responsive and that the majority of people are going to enjoy it," said Puffalt.
