Criticism of refuse costs

Press, 13 May 1981, Page 7

Criticism of refuse costs

The Kaiapoi Borough Council has decided to get legal advice on how’ clear its path would be .to withdraw from the Metropolitan Refuse Committee.

The Mayor, Mr H. W. Cumberland, said that he felt the refuse committee had broken its contract with the council.

The council ’ had paid $16,000 each year for the past three years. The bill had risen to $21,000 for the coming year, and was obviously going to increase by a similar amount next year. “That’s a lot of money for a small council to pay,” he said. “We’re paying the same amount per capita as the big councils.

"Apart from $lO,OOO set aside for the possibility of our own transfer station, which we had a fight getting in anyway, we have got nothing from the committee.”

Kaiapoi’s needs would not be looked at until at least six months after the Western Transfer Station opened in late June. The committee set a date for a Kair n landfill site at

December 1983. but had already set this back to 1986, said Mr Cumberland. The committee was still worried about where to site the Northern Transfer Station, even though it had some 11 sites to choose from. The refuse committee was one of the most unhappy committees he had ever been oh; he said. It was one longconfrontation. Cr A. H. Blackie said that although the council was not considering pulling out at this stage, perhaps news of seeking legal advice on how to pull out would galvanise someone in Christchurch into some action.

Mr Cumberland said that if the path for withdrawing was clear, the council still would have a period of use at its existing dump, and the 521,000 that would have gone to the refuse committee could be used to start a recycling system.

There was also some talk of developing a north Canterbury refuse scheme, which would be much better than belonging to the metropolitan one, said Mr Cumberland.