Toronto plans to start charging for trash pickup from churches, service agencies, retirement homes and other non-profit organizations that have long received the service for free.
Some 1,100 formerly exempt customers will pay commercial rates phased in over four years, and end up pumping $2.9 million annually into city coffers to recover the cost of collection and disposal.
The news comes as a shock, said John Campey, executive director of Social Planning Toronto.
“There’s been no consultation, no discussion, no sense of what the impact on any of those organizations will be,” Campey said. “It seems they just dreamt this up as a way of making some money.”
On Monday, council’s executive committee chaired by Mayor Rob Ford supported the change without debate in approving a water budget that raises rates by 9 per cent and a trash budget with no rate increase.
The proposed 2012 utility budgets go to city council for approval at the end of the month.
The executive committee also recommended that pickup of bagged, overflow recycling continue for another year. Ford suffered an embarrassing defeat when he was in the losing minority on the 5-4 vote on overflow recyclables. Officials had wanted to scrap the service to save $500,000 annually.
Charging non-profits is based partly on costs and partly on the fact other municipalities don’t offer free pickup, said Councillor Denzil Minnan-Wong, chair of the public works committee.
“Our costs are increasing,” he said. “We’d like to keep the cost of collecting solid waste down.”
A spokesman for the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Toronto said he would like to see details of how the proposal would affect the approximately 125 Catholic churches in the city.
“We’d like to get a better understanding of the implications for our churches,” said Neil MacCarthy, communications director for the archdiocese.
MacCarthy noted that many churches act as community hubs. They run Out of the Cold programs that offer food and shelter in the winter as well as education programs, activities for seniors and community meetings.
At this point, the archdiocese has no specifics on what the churches could expect to be charged for trash removal.
A table included in the budget documents said the non-profits would pay commercial fees.
For a curbside bin emptied weekly, the cost is $806. Twice-a-week service is $1,612. Non-profit customers would also have the option of putting out trash in yellow bags that cost $3.10 each.
The proposal also includes charging transfer station tipping fees at $100 per tonne of waste to previously exempt non-profits. They include the Children’s Aid Society, Goodwill, Habitat for Humanity, Salvation Army, St. Vincent de Paul, War Amputations of Canada and Yonge Street Mission.
Social Planning Toronto’s Campey has written to city councillors asking that the changes be postponed for at least a year.
“Many of the organizations who will be affected by this decision are still unaware of it — and the impact it will have on their budgets and operations for 2012 — budgets which, in many cases, have already been prepared and approved,” Campey wrote.
Non-profit organizations are willing to work toward achieving waste reduction goals set by the city, but that requires the city to be cooperative, he added.
“Nickeling and diming places of worship, charities, nursing homes and community support services, with no warning, is not a good way to start.”
Origin
Source: Toronto Star
Some 1,100 formerly exempt customers will pay commercial rates phased in over four years, and end up pumping $2.9 million annually into city coffers to recover the cost of collection and disposal.
The news comes as a shock, said John Campey, executive director of Social Planning Toronto.
“There’s been no consultation, no discussion, no sense of what the impact on any of those organizations will be,” Campey said. “It seems they just dreamt this up as a way of making some money.”
On Monday, council’s executive committee chaired by Mayor Rob Ford supported the change without debate in approving a water budget that raises rates by 9 per cent and a trash budget with no rate increase.
The proposed 2012 utility budgets go to city council for approval at the end of the month.
The executive committee also recommended that pickup of bagged, overflow recycling continue for another year. Ford suffered an embarrassing defeat when he was in the losing minority on the 5-4 vote on overflow recyclables. Officials had wanted to scrap the service to save $500,000 annually.
Charging non-profits is based partly on costs and partly on the fact other municipalities don’t offer free pickup, said Councillor Denzil Minnan-Wong, chair of the public works committee.
“Our costs are increasing,” he said. “We’d like to keep the cost of collecting solid waste down.”
A spokesman for the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Toronto said he would like to see details of how the proposal would affect the approximately 125 Catholic churches in the city.
“We’d like to get a better understanding of the implications for our churches,” said Neil MacCarthy, communications director for the archdiocese.
MacCarthy noted that many churches act as community hubs. They run Out of the Cold programs that offer food and shelter in the winter as well as education programs, activities for seniors and community meetings.
At this point, the archdiocese has no specifics on what the churches could expect to be charged for trash removal.
A table included in the budget documents said the non-profits would pay commercial fees.
For a curbside bin emptied weekly, the cost is $806. Twice-a-week service is $1,612. Non-profit customers would also have the option of putting out trash in yellow bags that cost $3.10 each.
The proposal also includes charging transfer station tipping fees at $100 per tonne of waste to previously exempt non-profits. They include the Children’s Aid Society, Goodwill, Habitat for Humanity, Salvation Army, St. Vincent de Paul, War Amputations of Canada and Yonge Street Mission.
Social Planning Toronto’s Campey has written to city councillors asking that the changes be postponed for at least a year.
“Many of the organizations who will be affected by this decision are still unaware of it — and the impact it will have on their budgets and operations for 2012 — budgets which, in many cases, have already been prepared and approved,” Campey wrote.
Non-profit organizations are willing to work toward achieving waste reduction goals set by the city, but that requires the city to be cooperative, he added.
“Nickeling and diming places of worship, charities, nursing homes and community support services, with no warning, is not a good way to start.”
Origin
Source: Toronto Star
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