West Grey is ditching its deal with Owen Sound on household hazardous waste and will be running a local service instead.
A report was brought forward by West Grey’s Environment and Capital Projects Officer Sarah Hanson at Tuesday’s council meeting.
It recommended forgoing the agreement with Owen Sound for 2023, and transferring over $35,000 from the landfill reserves to create a HHW mobile unit, as well as issue a tender to secure hauling, disposal and recycling of collected materials.
The report says proper management of waste is important, but for West Grey, there are only two key programs in place to collect these materials from residents, the City of Owen Sound partnership, and a municipal event day.
West Grey has traditionally worked with Owen Sound for scheduled waste drop off days, as the city hosts eight drop-off days each year between April and the end of October. Residents who attend must show valid I.D. and a pre-filled form detailing the materials to be disposed of, and limits households in West Grey to three units. Those who go over the limit can face a $45 charge per additional unit.
West Grey holds its own household hazardous waste event day each year in May.
The report says West Grey infrastructure and public works staff have been looking into opportunities to improve the current level of service by offering HHW disposal to residents free of charge all year.
In 2019, GM Blue Plan submitted an application for an amendment to add another Mobile Municipal Hazardous Special Waste (MHSW) depot for both the Bentinck and Durham landfills. Approval was given by the Ministry of the Environment, Conservation and Parks in 2020. As part of the approval, construction and installation of aspects of the mobile unit must be completed in the five years of receiving the approval, or the municipality would need to start the process over again.
The report says the mobile unit would be a custom built enclosed 40-yard bin, which is designed to contain drums and storage containers to safely receive and store HHW materials. It would alternate between the Durham and Bentinck landfill, moving every three months on rotation.
The collected waste would in turn be packed and removed before moving to the next location.
“The unit itself is able to hold 31,000 litres of HHW, so once we approach that amount, we would have to have a shipment, whether that came before the 90-day period,” says Hanson.
The 2022 budget does include $22,000 to hold a one day event, plus an additional $1,400 for an agreement with Owen Sound. About $6,000 will be needed to cover the cost of contracted services for removing, hauling, processing, recycling, and disposing of collected HHW materials.
“There would be pretty comprehensive staff training that would take place to run this mobile HHW unit. There would be a staff member that would be designated to ensure that we were keeping contamination down and only accepting materials within our specifications,” says Hanson.
