News Flash

Does it look like Spring already? Remember last year’s BIG April snowstorm! Look for Green Waste Containers on Monday, April 24th, 2017. Lots of planning and preparation goes on behind the scenes to get the Green Waste program ready. Below are just a few of those many schedule- and time-specific reasons the City adheres to this timeline. • The green waste program requires staff and equipment time of at least 24 hours per week which increases costs. The original program was set up to operate six months of the year. The City has added one month to the program. Additional time would further increase fees to our customers to cover increased costs. • Staff responsible for green waste collection work 6 days per week, and schedules must change to cover Saturday. Staff works each spring to repaint and re-label containers which must be completed annually before deployment and prior to any schedule changes. • Snow and rain in the containers freezes overnight and then the green waste and ice will not come out of the containers. • Some of the green waste sites must be graded with base-rock placed. This cannot be done in March because the ground is usually still frozen. • Many Green Waste sites are used to stage equipment for cleanup of trash on Community Cleanup Day, Saturday, April 22nd, 2017. • Placing the containers before cleanup day results in unsafe congestion at the green waste sites and overflowing trash mixed in the green waste containers. • We may well still get a heavy snow storm! Equipment and staff could try to get the containers dumped, but the lingering cold spring conditions compound the possible problems. • Landfill staff is currently grinding and mixing green waste from last year to make more space for trucks to dump new loads. This will be completed by mid-April. Remember, you are welcome to take your green waste to the landfill for FREE year round!