The Kind of Year It’s Been

2011. SWRC’s twentieth year. The first year of fixed provincial election dates. It seemed to me like knowing the election date just made politicians and bureaucrats get nervous sooner. Anything that might remotely be sensitive, like implementing the Multi-Material Recycling Program (MMRP) or expansion of the provincial recycling programs for oil and tires, got put on hold. The return of the pre-election cabinet should make it smoother to get things going again. Ministry officials beware: if you haven’t already received new copies of the proposals that were delayed by the election, you soon will.

The one new program that started this year was the pilot collection for grain bags and twine, operated by PCAB  (see saskpcab.com). They established collection depots in Estevan, Abbey, Moose Jaw, Viscount, Kelvington, Unity and Prince Albert, and bought bag rollers that farmers in the area could borrow to roll up the used grain bags for easier transport. Collection started in mid-July.

Municipally, not having an election on the horizon didn’t seem to help speed things up. Saskatoon and Regina have been seriously considering curbside collection for some time, but political wrangling  and the normal (glacial) pace of government have slowed things down. As a result, while things are moving forward, Saskatoon won’t have a program until sometime next year, and Regina’s program isn’t slated to start until the fall of 2013.

While both City programs have been delayed, the concerns were different in each city. Regina’s debate centred on whether the curbside collection should be public or private. The request for proposals for collection, issued in November, left it open and allows for submissions from both private businesses and City staff. Saskatoon’s issues revolved around protecting the current non-profit paper recycler, Cosmopolitan Industries. In the end, the City guaranteed Cosmo a set tonnage of paper fibre regardless of who gets the recycling contract. Saskatoon’s request for proposals was issued in November as well.

The estimated costs for the two cities are also different: Saskatoon has restricted the costs to just over $4/household/month while Regina estimates their costs will be in the $8-$10/household/month range. It’s going to be interesting watching these two processes evolve.

In November, Prince Albert moved the recycling bins from the South Hill Mall to the City Yards in response to complaints from the mall about messiness and dumping of inappropriate materials. The remainder of their depot sites are unchanged.

Moose Jaw commissioned a curbside recycling study in 2011 but hasn’t yet got the results.

Near the end of 2010, Yorkton switched their recycling program from bins to transparent bags, to reduce wind-blown debris and to make collection easier. It took some time for people to switch over, they needed a lot of reminding. Now, a year later, things are going well. The Sask. Abilities Council, Yorkton’s recycler, recently moved into a facility three times larger than their old one. This will give them the capacity to add processing equipment and to be more efficient.

North Battleford now has single stream depots provided by All Green Recycling. Everything, except glass, can be put in the same bin. The depots have separate bins for glass. All Green has also expanded its subscription curbside recycling service to include North Battleford residents.

Warman, Martensville, Dalmeny and Clavet all started community-wide curbside recycling programs this year. These programs are provided by All Green Recycling.

And in the ‘some things do happen pretty much on time’ department, 2011 was a milestone year for SARCAN with the opening of their new processing plant in Saskatoon. Check the news section on page 6 for details.

(Source: December 2011 WasteWatch)

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