Regina condo owners down in the dumps over food and yard waste program

As Regina takes another small step toward its composting program, some who live in condos are raising their voices in frustration.

Last Wednesday, city council approved the bylaw amendments that will allow the program to get going. The city is expecting the bins to be delivered in August and service to start in September.

But like with the recycling program, most condos in the city will have to have a plan for their food and yard waste but will have to figure out their own pickup and disposal plan.

“We are residential taxpayers, we are not commercial or industrial. First and foremost, we pay our taxes. We are not here to ask for special treatment, we are asking for fair treatment,” Jeff Campbell, the vice-president of Canadian Condominium Institute (CCI) Southern Sask., said in his presentation to city council.

Campbell told council his group has been looking around for options for its members and found no private companies that could do the work.

“The added cost for a lot of the extra condos is going to be exorbitant. There is one company out of Pilot Butte that does food waste; they charge $300 a month. When we contacted him, he said he’s a very tiny business and there’s no way he could handle the volume, so there’s no way we could do that,” explained Campbell.

In answering questions from councillors, Kurtis Doney — the city’s director of water, waste and environment — said administration expects that once the bylaw is finalized and passed, the private sector will fill the need.

“When governments mandate something, private sector typically responds, and so we would expect private sector to step up and provide that service whether it’s through collection or processing,” said Doney.

Campbell and CCI’s president, Dawna Matthews, said they were assured they would be consulted on this situation, but say they haven’t been.

“There are many unanswered questions that we have at this point in time and we have to try to get those answers so we can plan something that will be sustainable,” Matthews said in an interview.

Condo corporations will have to include food and yard waste in the solid waste management plan they file with the city and have it ready to be implemented by July 1, 2024.

That gives corporations about a year to figure something out, but Matthews doesn’t think it’ll be enough time.

“A year sounds like a long time but it goes very quickly,” said Matthews.

Matthews said it’s a particularly difficult situation for condos that just had to figure out a plan for their garbage pickup at the end of last year. The city ended its manual pickup which some condos had continued to use because their roads or lanes were too small for the city trucks.

“So then to be faced with this mandatory food waste handling within a year when we have not resolved even the garbage pickup was a complete shock and just added to the burden that many owners are going to be faced with,” she explained.

Campbell estimated there are tens of thousands of people in the city who will be affected by this. The City of Regina administration said there are 13,800 condo units in the city.

An amendment was brought to council to address Campbell’s concerns but was voted down. Some councillors who voted against it pointed out the timeline already included a year for a plan to be formulated.

Doney said during the Wednesday council meeting that the city would be willing to work with CCI, its members and non-member condo corporations on ideas to fulfil the requirements. However, he also said the city is not looking to invest a significant amount of money to change its collection model to accommodate the non-designated properties.

In a response to questions asked Friday, city administration said it consulted with waste collectors and processors last summer. They said their operations could be scaled up to accommodate waste from both residential and non-residential sectors, if mandated by the city.

Green bins

Last week, city council approved the amendments to the city’s waste bylaw to allow for the green bin program. The full bylaw needs one final approval, which is expected to come at the council meeting in July.

The changes added the requirements for the food and yard waste program including defining the materials to go in those bins and updating the materials for recycling and garbage bins.

It also made changes to allow for compostable bags, expanding cart provisions and the parties that will have to abide by those.

As well, it outlines the costs around the choices for different-sized garbage bins, a possibility for a second blue or green bin for an added fee, and the change from weekly and biweekly garbage pickup to biweekly year-round as green bins take over the split schedule.

EverGen is going to be processing the city’s food and yard waste and Doney said it’s in the process of building the processing plant. Doney also said the city is also putting backup plans in place in case it’s not ready in time.

The city’s goal is to achieve 65 per cent of waste to be diverted from the landfill through the blue and green bin programs to help extend the life of the landfill. Doney said the city will achieve more than 50 per cent with the food and yard waste program, and if it doesn’t get to 65 per cent over a few years, it’ll have to come back to council to be discussed.