New app a one-stop shop for region's waste program
Residents can have a variety of information specific to Waterloo Region at their fingertips via the Waste Whiz
Not sure when your garbage will be picked up? What’s currently allowed in the recycling bin? There’s an app for that.
The Region of Waterloo has just rolled out the application aimed at educating residents about better environmental practices.
“Waste Whiz” provides a variety of tools, including reminders for garbage and bulky items collection and service alerts, as well as customizable, region-specific recycling and garbage instructions.
The region had just reached the end of its contract with service providers for the existing “My Waste/ Recycle Coach” app. This provided an opportunity for staff to look for ways to improve the service, according to Cari Rastas Howard, project manager with the waste management program.
“[Residents] were looking items up and still ending up a little bit confused because the previous app was trying to use more generic information across many different municipalities,” she commented, of the need for a new app.
Waste Whiz is now 100 per cent customized to the
Waterloo Region. It’s been downloaded more than 1,100 times thus far.
New features include an online reporting of missed collection (previously only available on the region’s website). If an item not picked up during collection, residents can enquire as to why directly on the app as a “one-stop-shop.” Like the previous app, users also have the option to look up an item to find out where it should be properly disposed of.
Other benefits include a printable, 12-month customized calendar, and an interactive online game that puts one’s sorting skills to the test. Users choose a difficulty between 1-5, then they are presented with different disposal items such as medication, a pet food bag, or a coffee cup. The goal is to determine where it should go from the following options: return to the retailer/store, paper and plastic bags, green bin, containers only, garbage, or waste management drop off.
“We’ve chosen some items that are sometimes problematic for people, and then we’ll be able to use feedback from the game to see what are things that maybe people are still ... not sure about where they go,” said Howard. “We’ll know how to target our education programs moving forward. We can see what people are confused about.”
Staff can add information, pictures, edit, and make sure all of the information refers to the regions’ programs and ser
Afriend of mine – let’s call her Tara, because that’s her name – visited relatives in Michigan over the Christmas holidays, and noticed the price sticker for that evening’s turkey dinner proudly displayed on the refrigerator door.
It read $4.
Not $4 a lb. – $4 for the whole turkey.
Her hosts were ecstatic. They thought they’d snagged the bargain of the season and were eager to celebrate it.
But the price stuck in Tara’s craw.
“I knew it was somehow wrong to be giddy over a $4 turkey,” she said later, “but I didn’t exactly know why.”
It turns out she was struggling with the lure of cheap food. We’re all drawn into supermarkets by what are called loss leaders – that is, products the retailer purposefully sells at a loss just to get
shoppers into the store. Once they’re in, the thinking goes, they’ll buy enough other regularly priced items for the store to still make a profit.
Loss leaders are part of our overall shopping culture. Consumers get a deal, and maybe stores benefit at the till, where they’re clamouring for sales. Food retailing is highly competitive in Canada; we continually rank among the top five countries in the world that devote the least of our take-home pay to food.
But even though Canadians (and Americans) dedicate comparatively little to our food budget, rising food prices are still consumers’ biggest concern. So from purely a price perspective, Tara’s relatives can hardly be blamed for rejoicing about their $4 Christmas miracle.
Here, though, is the difference.
When loss leaders are dry goods, such as paper towels or toilet paper, few people along the supply chain will experience hardship or in fact hardly even notice.
However, it’s a different story when the loss leader is something that can be connected to your neighbour’s farm, like meat or vegetables ... because somewhere along the line, there’s a chance that farmers are getting shafted.
Staple foods sold as loss leaders create an expectation that they should always be bargain priced. And unless farmers have a bottomless treasury behind them – like some U.S. farmers have lately, thanks to their president throwing billions of dollars of subsidies at them – that’s just not possible.
Farming is a business, and businesses have to be profitable.
But the U.S. Christmas turkey scenario underlines how Canadian farmers are falling behind and are calling on the federal government for help.
Feed is a livestock farmer’s biggest expense. U.S. farmers who buy feed for their animals have been getting a bargain since the Trump subsidies began. They offset the true cost of feed production and allow U.S. farmers to sell it for less. Feed producers don’t need to make as much money from their crop when they’re getting big subsidy payments from Trump.
As a result, the cost of producing animals, like turkeys, goes down in the U.S.
Canadian grain producers don’t have the same kind of support as their American counterparts. But because the U.S. is such a huge grain exporter, its price is the price that everyone else is forced to charge.
In Canada, the price and production of turkey is controlled. That means farmers here have more latitude to implement animal welfare and food safety measures. It doesn’t mean turkeys in the U.S. are treated inhumanely or that their meat is not high quality. But the edge goes to Canada.
So what’s wrong with a $4 turkey?
There’s Tara’s next dinnertime discussion.
Thanking the Woolwich Fire Department, Elmira District Community Living this week donated $1,000 to the Floradale station.
Firefighters from Floradale visited a group home north of Elmira on Reid Woods Road on Monday night, not quite knowing what they were getting into.
“We didn’t have a clue! We thought we’d be having a plate of cookies and just enjoying time with the residents,” said district fire chief Dennis Frey with a laugh.
Both organizations have consistently maintained a close partnership, with the fire department helping with safety inspections, fire drills, and educating staff as to how to make the building as safe as possible.
EDCL staff expressed their gratitude; 12 people live in the home, nine of whom are in wheelchairs and most need assistance with personal care and daily routines. There are just two overnight staff at the group home.
“It is not an easy task for staff to be able to get them out of the home in case of a fire,” said Cheryl Peterson of EDCL. “Over the years, Floradale has provided a lot of advice and support to the staff and manager whenever we have needed it. It’s time we say ‘thank you.’”
The fire department will use the money at their discretion. In the past, Floradale has purchased a laptop, projector for training purchases, and defibrillator with donated money.
“Right now we’re looking at getting some reflective vests for the guys in their personal vehicles so that when they respond by themselves to an accident scene, they’ve got some identification on them,” said Frey, on possible uses of the funding.
Since members of the fire department are on call, they respond immediately to an emergency situation. As a result, members of the department may not have time to change into uniform, showing up in street clothing instead. This has lead to people on scene becoming confused as to who the firefighters are.
A reflective vest would help to solve that and provide a form of identification, said Frey. Firefighters would have access to it any time through their personal vehicles.
EDCL also donated to the Elmira fire station back in October.