South Frontenac Council - Feb. 15/11

Wilma Kenny | Feb 17, 2011

South Frontenac’s Waste Recycling Strategy

Last September, South Frontenac Township began a fully integrated waste management program, with the primary goal of providing a consistent level of service throughout the township. This presently includes providing weekly curbside pick-up of household garbage and recyclables; allowing residents access to all township waste sites; and a yard waste drop-off site at Portland landfill. (Curbside pick-up for residents on private lanes means at the point at which the lane meets the public road.)

“We’re heading in the right direction,” commented Public Works Manager Mark Segsworth, “and have had good cooperation. We know the system’s far from perfect, but we’re asking folks to be patient. By fall, the waste program will have been amalgamated for a full year, and we will have faced the challenges of seasonal variations by the end of the summer. Then, we will have a better sense of the impacts and demands across all seasons, and will be able to assess what changes we need to make to the current system.”

The primary goal of the program is to increase the life of the township landfill sites by diverting as much waste as possible. Once filled, a dumpsite is extremely expensive to close and monitor to provincial specifications, and creation of new waste sites is so difficult and costly, it is an option to be avoided. Based on provincial figures, 48% of the approximately 5,000 tonnes of residential solid waste generated in South Frontenac could be diverted from the landfill sites through recycling. Presently, South Frontenac diverts 20%, slightly less than the Southern Ontario average, and considerably less than townships such as North Frontenac Township, which has diversion rates in excess of 50%. Also, South Frontenac continues to show a steady annual population growth of 2%.

The Waste Recycling Strategy has, as its chief goal, to expand the lifetime of the landfills by increasing recycling and blue box use as much and as quickly as possible. Specifically, the township plans to raise its diversion rate to 25% in 2010, with the objective of achieving another 20% in the next five years, and at the same time, working to reduce recycling costs.

How can this be accomplished? Largely through public education and incentives, aimed at getting people to put out less garbage, by diverting more of their discarded material into recycling.

“We hope to avoid enforcement or using transparent bags,” says Segsworth, “Surely we don’t need to go there.”

He listed three main challenges for the coming months: 1) managing the impact of the seasonal residents in Bedford, 2) getting the hazardous waste depot up and running, and 3) reviewing all the waste disposal sites, in order to develop an integrated system of staffing and hours.

Bag Tags:

These tags are made to stick to themselves, not to garbage bags, so work best if wrapped around the neck of the tied bag.

“People have been good about tagging their garbage bags, and they have worked well as an incentive to reduce garbage,” said Mark Segwsworth.

Presently each residence is issued 50 tags a year: additional tags are available for $2. Some municipalities have moved to bag limits, or complete user pay systems, where all tags must be purchased. One advantage to the bag tag system as opposed to a one or two bag per week limit is that residents have more choice about the number of bags they put out at any one time, and are less likely to put out half-full bags.

Some Tips: Try to avoid putting out half-full blue boxes: the less stops the truck has to make, the more cost-efficient the program. Crush cans and plastic bottles to reduce volume and prevent them blowing away. Replace the lids on crushed plastic bottles or they will pop back into their original size. And please don’t put lids on uncrushed plastic bottles: that makes them remarkably resistant to being flattened!

At their meeting on Tuesday night (February 15) Council agreed to receive the Draft Waste Recycling Strategy as presented by Mark Segsworth “for public input”. It will be posted on the Township website: township.southfrontenac.on.ca for residents to read and comment. A copy will also be available at the Township office

Coming Soon:

Re-use Website

South Frontenac will soon launch a website free to local residents for exchange or sale of unwanted items.

Household Hazardous Waste

The township’s permanent site at Keeley Road will open on a regular basis later this spring. In the meantime, electronic waste can be dropped off at either Loughborough or Portland landfills, to be sent on for recycling. By fall, the site will accept bale and boat wrap plastics.

Recyclable Plastics

Kingston Area Recycling (KARC), which receives and processes the township’s recycling, is seeking out new markets for a wider range of plastics than is presently accepted.

Other items from South Frontenac Council

Triathlon in Sydenham

Recreation Coordinator Ashley Brown asked council to support this event by closing the boat ramp and the Point to the public on Sunday July 3, for the Sydenham Triathlon, Duathlon and Run, to be hosted by Somersault Events. Brown noted that this will be the third year: last year, over 400 people participated. Council agreed and will be signing a 5-year contract for this event: either party will be able to opt out with nine months’ notice.

Proposed Zoning By-law Amendment

Planner Lindsay Mills, who was not present at the meeting, asked for council’s guidance on several matters related to Scott Asseltine’s proposal to add storage units to his car wash business on Road 38. Asselstine was in attendance at the meeting. There was general agreement that if the storage unit was built, there would not be a requirement for a berm or fence; a traffic study would not be required, completion date should be set at the end of October, and a $5,000 refundable security deposit would be required. The site plan and zoning amendment will come to council in March for a formal vote.

Committee Appointments

Council passed a by-law appointing members to various boards, committees and associations for the 2011-2014 term. At Councilor McPhail’s request, the ‘Point Improvement Committee’ was removed from the list until council has an opportunity to debate their goals and objectives.