By Cecilia Nasmith
Northumberland County's standing Public Works Committee has voted against another consultation with residents of the rural ward of the Municipality of Port Hope on whether they want curbside garbage pickup.
The municipality did request this latest consultation from the county, Manager of Environmental and Technical Services Adam McCue said, in light of changes to the county's new waste-collection format that separates recyclables further.
Rural-ward Port Hope residents opted out of curbside waste collection about 20 years ago, when the Town of Port Hope and Township of Hope amalgamated under direction from the provincial government of the day. Since then, rural residents have disposed of their garbage at the Hope Transfer Station. The recent change in recycling will necessitate changes to the transfer station and, in advance of the municipality going to this effort and expense, they had asked the county to reach out for a consultation.
There have already been two consultations, McCue noted, the most recent one in 2018 including a survey that had a very high response. Of those responding, he said, 64% wanted to continue using their own transfer station as opposed to receiving curbside pick-up.
Each consultation costs about $5,000, he reasoned, and the last one done was fairly recent.
The motion the committee passed declined Port Hope's request to put the onus on the municipality – should they desire to have those curbside pick-up services extended to the rural ward, it continued, the county will work with its waste-collection contractor to develop an implementation plan which it will then share with Port Hope council.
