Barrie council wants to review condo trash plan

By Bob Bruton, Barrie Examiner

Council wants a report on city trash collection for multi-residential buildings before the plan’s in place.

That report should be ready by July 1.

Coun. Michael Prowse asked for a report Monday to detail the preferred implementation plan, its annual costs and the implications of the program as it relates to potential future requests from the industrial, commercial and institutional sectors to be added to the service, or a rebate.

“I think we went too far and didn’t know the full implications,” he said of adding this service to the operating/capital budget, at a cost of $115,000 this year.

Mayor Jeff Lehman’s motion added the service. He had argued condo owners shouldn’t be paying for garbage pickup through their property taxes and condo fees, and that it is a matter of fairness.

The city has received petitions from several condo boards about the current service level.

Lehman wanted the plan in place for an October start, and he said Monday that can still happen.

“If we get the report back by summer, we can make some decisions then,” he said.

Barrie’s garbage pickup doesn’t include the multi-residential sector – complexes with six or more units, cluster townhouses on private roads – that don’t use curbside collection services.

City staff polled 18 other municipalities and found that three provide a property tax rebate to those which use a private trash hauler, while eight provide front-end garbage collection to multi-residential properties.

Front-end collection requires special trucks, different than those used in Barrie, with retractable forks to lift large waste bins over the truck’s cab and into its bin.

The best estimate for this service in Barrie is a $230,000 cost, although that number is two years old.

To deliver this service, that amount would need to go into the city’s annual operating budget for environmental services, which includes waste management, pegged at $8.6 million in 2015.

The city has 272 multi-residential complexes and approximately 30 cluster townhouse complexes on private roadways.

But the Ontario Municipal Act states property taxes are based on assessment or land value, not on services provided or not provided.

The city doesn’t give rebates on other services residents pay for through their property taxes, such as public transit or recreational facilities, but might not use.

Property tax assessment includes a portion for waste management, for curbside collection and disposal.

Questions have also been asked whether the residents would actually see the financial benefit of this plan, or whether it would just be pocketed by condo management companies or landlords.