City eyes expanding bulk garbage collection

Business has quadrupled since the city dropped its fee to pick up old couches, mattresses and other big refuse items, from $20 to $10. Now, council has asked staff to look into expanding the bulk collection program, to include apartment buildings and to allow councillors request free pickups of junk that’s been dumped illegally in someone’s alley or property. The program was started in 2017 as a way to address illegal dumping and give residents an easier way to get rid of the bulky junk, rather than driving it to the Central Avenue transfer station. During that first year when the fee was $20, the city received about 10 calls a week. Now that it’s $10, the city is getting 40 to 50 calls. “Definitely the $10-an-item is a much more acceptable fee for our residents,” manager of environmental services Anne-Marie Albidone said Tuesday. Under the program, residents can call the city’s 311 service to have up to two items picked up. All the collection zones are covered twice a month, from April to November.

The annual budgeted cost for the program is $37,000 — the cost for tipping fees and the contracted service that the $10 fees don’t cover.

“It’s a very inexpensive program and yet highly valuable for our residents,” Albidone said.

Staff are looking for ways to extend the service to apartment residents. Albidone said the city can’t just offer the same service because that could result in huge unsightly piles of furniture sitting in front of large apartment buildings for days, with others adding to the pile without paying the fee.

“It’s logistically very difficult to do apartment buildings the way the program is set up now,” she said. While council on Monday asked staff to study how to service apartments, it turned down expanding the service to commercial businesses.