By Cecilia Nasmith
Twelve days after Brighton Mayor Brian Ostrander failed to get a seconder to his motion to help encourage the community's self-isolation efforts with a temporary waiver on bag-tag requirements for curbside garbage collection, Northumberland County did an about-face on the idea.
Cramahe Councillor Mandy Martin was the seconder to his motion at the special March 30 meeting held by teleconference and – as amended – the motion was passed to allow every household and business served by the county's curbside-collection service one free bag of garbage weekly between April 1 and May 29.
For residents of rural Port Hope not serviced by curbside pick-up, they will be allowed a maximum of one free bag of garbage per week as they take their waste to the Hope transfer station.
The motion included provision for the timeline to be extended, should that be deemed an appropriate measure.
Council received a report from Manager of Environmental and Technical Services Adam McCue saying that similar measures are being taken in such municipalities as Quinte West, Kingston, Belleville, Durham, Napanee and Prince Edward County.
The report set out the fallout from one free bag per week, including the loss of perhaps $490,000 in bag-tag revenue that might otherwise have been realized as revenue to the county.
It also explored ideas for coping with this revenue shortfall, and this side of things did trouble Hamilton Township Mayor Bill Cane.
“I don't see this as a waiver,” Cane said.
“Technically, it's a deferral. The money is going to have to come back to us somehow.”
“The money has to come from somewhere at some time – it's not going to go away,” Warden Bob Sanderson agreed.
“I think this whole COVID pandemic is going to have some associated costs down the line, and I am looking at this one on a purely temporary basis.”
Martin said she would have supported this move even on a larger scale – two free bags or even more, for instance, with the waiver lasting as long as Ontario Premier Doug Ford's state of emergency continued.
She also said that worrying about the cost at this time is putting the cart before the horse.
“The whole country, the whole province, the whole world is at this point trying to figure out what the results are going to be.
“When we are looking at budgets, this is one infinitesimal amount of what we are going to be dealing with in terms of the overall county budget. Maybe it means we cut something. Maybe it means a service is dropped. We are going to have to look at the whole picture, and you can't do it be 25-cent increments,” she said, referring to one suggestion that another 25 cents might be tacked onto bag-tag costs when the waiver expires.
“Everyone knows as we have gone through this that things have changed daily in the sense of how serious it is. In the last two weeks, we have been through two years of crisis management. To quibble over a bag of garbage and 25 cents misses the point. We are going to have to deal with it in the future, but it's just one aspect of this whole situation we are facing.”
“I wasn't in favour originally,” Deputy Warden Bob Crate said.
“But I have had a number of calls from people who are trying to social-distance, and I would be agreeable to a situation where a person could put out a bag of garbage weekly until such time as we decided this pandemic was over because I think we have to lend a hand where we can.”
“I was very adamant in not agreeing with waiving tag fees,” Sanderson agreed.
“But we would be remiss if we didn't consider removing tag fees for a period of time, with a restriction on it.”
The motion passed unanimously.
The other key item of business council passed was a motion to permit electronic meetings of council during times when the province or head of council has formally declared an emergency. Sanderson declared that he was seated at his usual warden's seat with a couple of support staff seated the appropriate distance away, Cane in a downstairs office and remaining council members from a variety of remote locations.
Council passed a motion to proceed with their next regularly scheduled council meeting in this new format, on April 15.
