Recycling Update - Cosmo, glass, and the RFP
On Monday City Council made a big step toward city-wide curbside recycling by approving the concept of an RFP and some key principles to guide the direction of it. This is great news as there have been many people waiting for this, and many working towards this end for along time. The next step is for the administration to draft the RFP and bring it to City Council for approval during our meeting on July 13th. The City has just produced an FAQ sheet giving some more background on where we are at that can be found here: http://t.co/AP2ALT2
City Council decided not to use a zone approach but to have one contract for the City as a whole. There was also a majority support for not including glass collection in the RFP, as it 1% of the waste stream, currently has little value, and is the source of the most problems of contamination of recylables in other Cities. This is not the end of glass collection, and other options will be explored.
Cosmo Industries
I have been receiving quite a few calls from people concerned about the fate of Cosmo Industries and the City's commitment to them. I want to provide some background information about what the City has committed and some of the background of this relationship as I know there have been criticisms about that I frankly don't think have been entirely fair.
I certainly understand the anxiety that many Cosmo participants and their families are facing as all of the rumours of the demise of Cosmo's program swirl around. I have spent time at Cosmo and seen the operations that exist and the very important and unique community that has been created there. I am committed to playing a part in ensuring that this continues, and I believe that the commitments that the City has made are substantial, and go beyond our commitment to most other non-profits that exist in this City.
Cosmo was ultimately requesting for the City to grant them a monopoly over all of the paper collected in this new residential curbside program. This would mean that we would have to go with a dual stream approach to recycling, which is an option but is an option that requires more than one pickup, adding to collection costs, and there are indications that you end up with 20-45% less materials through dual stream recycling. Secondly, because paper is the highest value commodity in the recycling stream, any company providing collection and processing of recyclables would have to forgo that revenue that would offset their costs of providing the program.
The decision was made to offer as much flexibility as possible in the bidding process, while focusing on performance goals of low contamination, ease of use, affordability, and sustainability. This is still only one aspect of recycling in Saskatoon - households. There is still paper and recycling existing (and future opportunities) with apartments and condos, small business, large business, and public institutions. We have flexibility to work with Cosmo in these areas.
The City has committed to getting Cosmo Industries 7800 tonnes of paper per year for the next 7 years, and in the meantime to set up a task force or initiate a study to identify further job opportunities within and beyond recycling that would provide that certainty for the 20 or so people who are involved in the paper sort line.
Given the criticism that is being levelled I would also like to make it clear that Cosmo already has been supported at a level quite a bit higher than most other community based non-profits in Saskatoon. Saskatoon purchased the building that they occupy in 1984 and leases the building back to them for 1$ so they don't pay rent. They have recieved a full property tax abatement since 2005 amounting to over $120,000. When they did a building expansion in 2007 to increase recycling the City contributed over $237,000. In the meantime we have averaged a net cost of over $190,000/yr in paying for the pickup and delivery and processing of paper to Cosmo over the past several years, a practice which in other communities often turns a profit.
I believe we can do our part to help ensure that the vital community that exists around Cosmo and its paper recycling can continue while we also work towards a recycling program that is as affordable, effective, and sustainable as possible. This does require a willingness to adapt and collaborate as we move forward.
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