Saskatoon anti-waste group starts letter-writing campaign to save pay-as-you-throw

An environmental group in Saskatoon has begun a letter writing campaign in the wake of threats to the city's pay-as-you-throwgarbage collection system.

Last month, councillor Darren Hill announced he wanted to rescindthevote he had made in favour of the proposal, which passed 6-5 in council.

Under the new regime, households would have the ability to select from three sizes of garbage containers. The larger the container, the more the household would pay. The move would take garbage collection out of property tax and make it into a utilitywhich would be paid monthly.

Waste Not YXE is concerned a new vote would stop the initiative in its tracksand wants to do everything it can to keep pay-as-you-throw happening.

"At this point, it's kind of the only thing people can do," said group member Christine Wilson. "We need to make sure people have a voice."

The change to garbage pickup, along with a city-wide composting system, is designed to cut down the amount of garbage generated by the city.

A report said that if something wasn't done about the amount of trash the city generates, a new landfill would need to be built at a cost of up to $100 million. There would also be additional costs if garbage needed to be moved further outside the city.

Although he voted to have it installed, Hill later questioned the need for a pay-as-you-throw systemand said the city could find other ways of diverting wasterather than changing the entire system.

Wilson maintained that pay-as-you-throw would significantly drop the amount of garbage coming out of city homes. She saidsimilar systems have dropped garbage generation from anywhere from six to 40 per cent in other cities, according to her research.

"Just because the vote was so close, I'm quite concerned that means this is just going to get tossed," she said. "I don't really know then how they would proceed."

The motion to rescind Hill's vote will be held at the next Saskatoon City Council next Monday. If it's successful, a new vote on the garbage system would be held sometime in 2019.