Following the March 25 closure of the Brighton landfill and the Seymour and Bewdley community recycling centres to members of the public, Northumberland County council this week directed staff to reopen these sites to the public.
The reopening must take place by May 1, and staff are asked to make any changes to hours and days of operation and to alter how the sites are run in any way necessary to ensure that social distancing and all other public-safety requirements are met.
The county-council motion came after the Municipality of Port Hope forwarded their motion requesting the reopening passed at its own April 7 council meeting.
Chief administrative officer Jennifer Moore offered some comments from a staff perspective about a move taken with the goal of protecting both staffers and members of the public, consistent with the recommendations of Health Canada to stay home and skip nonessential trips even within one’s own community.
Home curbside collection continues, Moore pointed out, and the landfill does still serve commercial customers.
She acknowledged the risk of increased illegal dumping – at this point last year, they’d had 17 incidents and, so far this year, are up to 29. And COVID-19 safety measures mean the annual Mayor’s Clean-Up Challenge will not happen in 2020.
County staff are enforcing illegal dumping regulations, with fines that range from $305 to $5,000.
Moore also acknowledged concerns she’d heard from some fire chiefs about illegal burning.
“We know there are some people raising concerns about the inconvenience, having to keep their bulky waste at home,” Moore acknowledged.
The one-free-bag-of-garbage weekly allowance allays some of this accumulation (judging by slightly increased collection volumes), but certainly not all. And along with the loss of that bag-tag revenue, the county is experiencing a loss of tipping-fee revenue at the closed landfill – though this should be recouped to some degree whenever a reopening can occur.
But another concern Moore mentioned is traffic, especially at the Bewdley site where there’s limited space for cars to queue up. With people spring-cleaning and amassing bulky waste to dispose of, she foresees traffic lined up through the gates and out on to County Road 9, where a safety risk is created.
As Port Hope Mayor, Warden Bob Sanderson spoke to the motivations behind the motion his council had passed and forwarded, such as the illegal dumping issue and the frustrated telephone calls councillors are receiving. Meanwhile, people are staying home and using the time for spring cleaning – and all the discarding that comes with it.
Brighton Mayor Brian Ostrander said the most frequent complaint he receives is from people selling their homes and moving, who have a lot of bulky waste they do not want to have to take with them. He wondered if there might be consideration to opening the dump and recycling centres on an appointment basis. Moore did not think this would be easily done.
“Even keeping Brighton landfill open for commercial waste, there’s a lot of challenges for staff to monitor and police that, with people trying to challenge and get around the rules,” she said.
Cramahe Mayor Mandy Martin asked if staffers who would otherwise work at these sites are laid off. Moore replied that they are performing alternate duties, like litter clean-up and maintenance and other tasks at the closed sites.
Since they’re already there, Martin continued, they would be readily available if the sites reopened – which she made clear was a good idea, in her opinion.
“To me, the landfill is an essential service,” she stated.
“We are getting more incidents of illegal dumping, things like mattresses and larger household items.
“When we first went through this, we thought it was two weeks, maybe four weeks. Now we are looking at months.”
Martin suggested safety might be increased by going cashless to pay tipping fees. Moore said this was not an option, due to inadequate online connectivity capacity at these locations.
“Primarily, our concern is managing patrons onsite, as well as the messaging it gives the public,” she said.
“It’s tough, but I think at some point – whether or not we were to take some extra staff and maybe only do it on a weekend – I think we do have to find some accommodation,” Deputy Warden Bob Crate said.
“It’s a revenue generator, and we are going to be very in need of revenue,” Sanderson pointed out.
Hamilton Township Mayor Bill Cane said he’d heard through the grapevine that Peterborough County had a similar closure and has just reversed it – “with certain limitations. We can certainly look into those,” he suggested.
“I would support opening, but with limitations. Maybe a certain number of days, maybe a maximum number of vehicles on the site at one time.”
Measures to do that would add to operating costs, Moore pointed out, perhaps as much as $1,200 a day for such things as hiring extra security.
“We would expect, even with limited days, we would have excessive line-ups of people coming to the site.”
“Those line-ups will come sooner or later,” Cane countered.
“The longer we keep the dump and transfer stations closed, the more refuse that collects at home and the longer those line-ups are going to be. It’s certainly a risk, but that is going to happen sooner or later no matter what we do.”
Ostrander made the motion for the reopening, with a request for a staff report at the next council meeting outlining risk-mitigation measures that had been implemented and how well they are working. The motion passed, with only Alnwick-Haldimand Mayor Gail Latchford and Cobourg Mayor John Henderson voting in opposition.