On Friday, March 28, the municipality held a special council meeting to address concerns about the cancellation of “free clean-up days” previously scheduled three times per year. Mayor Jack Adelaar said the decision to cancel these events was made in his absence, and he asked council to revisit it. After debating the issue and hearing from the head of Bowen Waste Services, Dave McIntosh, council agreed to
re-instate the summer and fall clean-up days, with the aim to charge users for these services in the future.
Councillor Cro Lucas told council that Bowen Island is the only municipality in the lower mainland where citizens don’t pay for special waste disposal days.
“The issue is not whether we cancel free pick-ups. Free does not make sense. We have worked very hard to keep tax raises below three percent, and this would add another one percent and not everyone uses it.”
Abbotsford, Lucas added, issues coupons for people to purchase in advance of the waste clean-up days. The cost of such a system, as calculated by Bowen’s manager of finance, Kirsten Watson, would likely equal a charge of $8 per car bringing waste and $16 per truck.
Watson said that items such as mattresses, which cost $20 to drop off at the North Shore Transfer Station, should be added to those fees.
“It costs us $10,575 to run one of these events,” said Watson. “Trying to recoup those costs would be prohibitive.”
Councillor Andrew Stone said he agreed that there should be an extra fee for disposing of items such as mattresses, where extra costs are incurred. He added that from his perspective, the cost of free waste clean-up days is well worth it if divided among the island’s homeowners.
“When these clean-up days were established it probably cost $10 for car and driver to take the ferry, and the price of gas was well under a dollar per litre,” said Stone. “Now we’re looking at a minimum cost of $45 per trip, plus the time… We have a commuting crowd on the island that makes up about half of the island… and here we are forcing them to have to borrow, beg, or steal a van from their neighbours and fill it up with stuff to take to the transfer station when they already have to go to town five days a week. Many of them have kids who have activities on the weekend and then Stone said that if the cost of waste clean-up days were divided among the island’s 2,100 households, it would cost each one $0.04 per day.
Watson reminded the councillors that the island’s solid waste program is not, in fact, funded by property taxes, but rather, by parcel taxes and the purchase of garbage decals.
Councillor Alison Morse brought up the fact that even with the cancellation of the free clean-up days, the cost of both of these has risen from last year by $3 each.
“If we were to re-implement say two of the solid waste days, those would go up further, adding another $4 to the parcel tax and $8 to the decals, bringing the total up $18 from last year.”
After debating the fairness of asking all households to cover the cost of the clean-up days, council agreed to re-implement two free waste clean-ups in 2014, one in mid-July and one in mid-October. Watson explained that this decision will mean that a revised version of the budget will need to be drafted and passed through council’s approval.
Dave McIntosh’s Waste Clean-Up Days Facts
1. Free clean-up days started on Bowen 20 year ago as part of the contract between the municipality and Bowen Waste Services.
2. In 2013, Bowen Waste Services collected more than 24 tonnes of garbage on each of the clean-up days.
3. Since Metro Vancouver started charging for the disposal of mattresses five years ago, Bowen Island Municipality has not covered the cost of disposal of one mattress. McIntosh says he has covered that cost, having collected more than 500 mattresses.
4. Of the past five summer clean-up days, the municipality only paid for one. McIntosh says he started the extra day because it was necessary, and covered the cost of it.
5. In the course of his 3.5 months of negotiations with the municipality about taking over the recycling depot, McIntosh says that the clean-up days were not discussed, beyond a mention of their popularity
