Estevan City Council has decided to bite the bullet and will move forward with a curbside recycling and garbage program.
In a decision that is likely to create a great deal of controversy, council voted Monday night to adopt the change in garbage pickup along with the new recycling program. Regens Disposal of Estevan was the lone company to submit a tender to the City, and the two sides have an agreement in principle.
In regards to the recycling program, Mayor Roy Ludwig said the City would like to spend the next couple of months working out any "kinks" such as confirming areas of the City where curbside pickup would not be feasible. Once that is dialed in, he expects they would begin rolling the program out, with the Pleasantdale area likely first up.
"We have front yard pickup there anyways so perhaps we would like to look at recycling there for the first few months and once we get that behind us it will slowly evolve throughout the City," Ludwig said. "We have to work out the issues where we cannot do front (pickup) because Regens is giving us a cheaper deal if we can go all front. However, there are some areas of our community where we will not be able to do it in the front and we recognize that, however, where we can and the rationale is there that we can, we would like to work through the front."
As for the switch in garbage service, Ludwig said the City plans to give residents notice of the decision before moving the cans curbside.
"We would like to give fair notice so we would probably like to see towards the end of July so we have a few weeks notice," he said. "We'll start moving where we can, where it makes sense and where it will work in the front and then ironing out where we can't do the front and what we'll do there.
"Usually if it's a block where we have issues it will have to be the block, we can't go house by house so where we have issues on a given block it may have to be identified as back alley."
Garbage pickup, and to a lesser extent, recycling has been the most divisive issue in the City since council elected to go with an automated program in 2008.When it was first introduced, the plan called for all garbage to be collected in front of homes. However, the backlash was so extreme that council attempted to quell the controversy by continuing with back alley pickup in applicable areas of Estevan.
Although many remained unhappy with the decision, the furor eventually died down and the new system became somewhat popular with most residents.
That period of calm will likely come to an end, as there has been vocal opposition to curbside garbage pickup. At a recent public meeting on garbage and recycling, those in attendance said they were in favour of recycling provided it was back alley pickup. When it came to garbage, the crowd was nearly unanimous in their disapproval of curbside collection.
"We are hopeful that our community will work with us and work with Regens to make this happen," Ludwig said when asked if he expects there to be a backlash. "Change did not come easy with the garbage but we worked through that. We are not saying this is going to work perfectly, of course it won't, there is going to be some issues that will have to be dealt with moving forward. But once we get the garbage issues straightened out, then we will move into recycling within a few months hopefully. Council does feel that recycling is advantageous, it will save our landfill and it is what most communities are doing. It's just the right thing to do environmentally."
Ludwig added there is also a significant cost savings with having both recycling and garbage collected in front of homes.
"They are giving us a cheaper price to go all front because it is going to be better for their equipment."
According to the report presented Monday by city manager Jim Puffalt, the bi-weekly curbside recycling program will see the new bins picked up once every two weeks at a cost of $5 per home. The fee will be reviewed when the province provides more details on their multi-material recycling program, which is expected to help communities cover some of their costs.
Puffalt also recommended a one-year trial period of weekly curbside waste collection beginning on Sept. 30 at a cost of $5.35 per month. If the City had gone with the status quo regarding garbage collection it would have cost $7.35 a month. Although Ludwig described the one year as more of a phase-in period, Puffalt's report called for a report to be completed after the one year trial and presented to the community in 2014.
The report also addressed back alley maintenance, which has been a concern for residents who fear the City would no longer maintain alleys if the garbage cans were moved. The recommendation was that back alley maintenance and snow removal continue with an anticipated enhanced level of maintenance due to the removal of waste carts and waste collection trucks.
The report also recommended that the recycling depot on Sixth Street remain in operation for commercial purposes and that the $5 rebate from the sale of materials be used to subsidize the cost of the depot as well as the cost of administration of the waste and recycling program.
The recommendations were all passed unanimously.
