Green cart program inches forward
When the idea of a citywide recycling program that included organic material was first discussed at city council, councillors were known as aldermen, Donald Trump was a reality television show host and Calgary’s population was less than one million.
Next year, five years after the city began testing compost services in a handful of communities and more than a decade after talk of a compost program first hit council’s radar, green carts will arrive at singlefamily homes in neighbourhoods across the city.
The green cart program moved another step forward on Wednesday, when a committee recommended council give three readings to an amended waste and recycling bylaw that now includes words such as “compostable bag” and “food and yard waste material.”
“When this goes through, let’s party. I’m going to party,” Coun. Druh Farrell, who has been demanding better waste-diversion practices for many years, said at Wednesday’s meeting.
According to the city, compostable food scraps and yard material make up 65 per cent of the waste generated by single-family homes, 39 per cent of the waste generated by multi-family homes and 24 per cent of the waste generated by the industrial, commercial and institutional sectors.
Most other major cities across Canada and many smaller towns already have programs in place to divert food and yard waste from the landfill, and it’s expected Calgary’s green cart program will keep more than 90,000 tonnes of food and yard waste out of the dump by 2025.
The changes to the bylaw introduce new sections that are designed to require food and yard waste diversion and they allow enforcement with fines, though city administration emphasized Wednesday that education will be used first and fines are an “absolute last resort.”
If council approves the changes, most will come into effect Nov. 1, 2017, to give Calgarians time to get used to putting food waste, coffee filters, leaves, cat litter, pet hair, used paper towel and more in green bins.