Better not good enough
Percentage of contaminants in blue bins down but must drop below 3% or regional district faces penalties
The percentage of contaminants in curbside recycling carts is declining, but the regional district still faces penalties as people misuse the blue bins.
When inspectors first checked the recycling cart contents three years ago, almost three-quarters of the blue bins contained banned items such as glass, clothes and household garbage. A similar survey last year found about half the carts contained prohibited items.
A third inspection, now underway across the Kelowna area with regional employees peering into 3,500 blue bins, aims to determine if the contamination rate has dropped further.
By total weight volumes, about 15 per cent of blue bin contents collected annually from 55,000 homes in the Central Okanagan consist of banned items. The contractor, Recycle B.C., can financially penalize the regional district unless the contamination rate drops below three per cent.
The penalties, provided for in the contract, are applied because it costs more to sort out banned items from the recycling stream. And those penalties would be significant, amounting to as much as $5,000 per Kelowna route, which typically has between 800 and 1,200 homes.
The contractor has warned of penalties in the past, but the likelihood of such sanctions has risen given the continuing high rates of contamination in the recycling carts. Other banned items regularly found in the blue bins include garden hoses, electronics, scrap metals and yard waste.
Each collection truck has onboard cameras the driver uses to make a quick check of what’s been picked up and dumped into the vehicle. Every year, about 2,500 people, representing five per cent of all Central Okanagan homeowners, get letters from the regional district advising them they’re using their recycling carts improperly.
“Generally speaking, I’d say most people appreciate the information on what they should be putting in their carts,” said regional district spokesperson Cynthia Coates.
Repeat offenders will likely get a followup phone call from the regional district. In rare cases, people can be banned from the pickup system if they’re constantly putting the wrong materials in the bins.