Rates are going up for the Town of Banff to pick up your garbage and recycling.
On Thursday (Dec. 13), council voted to increase solid waste utility rates for commercial properties by 2.9 per cent in 2014 and a further 3.9 per cent in 2015, and residential rates by 3.6 per cent next year and an additional 4.4 per cent in 2015.
“I am OK with a $9.37 per year increase in 2014 for residents and an additional $12 per year increase the following year,” said Mayor Karen Sorensen. “Garbage is really expensive and it’s our intention to cover our costs to pick it up.”
Councillor Stavros Karlos, however, wanted to ease the financial burden on Banff residents.
He argued to use money from the utility rate stabilization fund, which has a current balance of $127,157, to lower the amount of the increase.
“I know the amount of dollars are low for the rate increase, but they are compounded with other things,” he said. “I do believe we have enough experience with this reserve that we have mitigated risks, and this reduction is not huge.”
In 2011, The Town of Banff introduced a new user-pay waste and recycling utility to be phased in over four years. It shifted the system from tax-based to user-pay by volume for commercial properties and as a flat fee for residential properties.
By 2013, ratepayers were paying for 75 per cent of their solid waste on their utility bill and 25 per cent on their property tax bill, with the intention of eventually moving 100 per cent to utility bills.
However, council this week decided to keep people paying 75 per cent through user fees, with 25 per cent continuing to be tax-supported. The thinking was businesses might find it easier and cheaper to just contract a private company to pick up all their waste, without separating it.
This would mean that tonnes of organics might go to landfill instead of into the composting system, whereas keeping part of the fee as tax-supported could provide a financial incentive for businesses to separate and recycle.
“This community has environmental goals and objectives and landfilling does not achieve those,” said Paul Godfrey, the Town of Banff’s operations manager.
“It’s always cheaper and easier to do the wrong thing, but using an outside hauler would erode our goal to be a model environmental community.”
The increase to commercial garbage and recycling rates is 25 per cent less than initially thought.
Officials say that’s because the Town of Banff is hiring a drop-off yard attendant who will be able to better monitor what waste is coming in, and therefore, potentially increase revenue that is currently being missed.
“The drop-off yard, rightly or wrongly, is based on the honour system, but we started auditing and we put in cameras, and we realized we are getting a lot more stuff than what is registered,” said Godfrey. “Without a person-controlled booth, we are leaving a lot of revenue on the table.”
