Posted on 02/24/2005 6:12:09 AM PST by redrunner
Toronto's daily garbage shipments to Michigan could get more expensive under a plan in that state to dramatically raise dumping fees, but the city says it would not have to cover any increase.
In an attempt to reduce trash imports from Canada and other U.S. states, Michigan's Democrats announced plans yesterday to introduce a bill in the state's legislature to charge a $7.50 (U.S.) fee on each U.S. ton of garbage dumped in the state. The current fee is just 21 cents.
City officials say this would add $10-million to the approximately $54-million annual cost of shipping all of Toronto's waste to a Michigan landfill site. But they added the city would not have to cover the cost.
Jane Pitfield, chair of Toronto City Council's works committee, said the city's legal department has checked the contract with Republic Services Inc., the company that owns and operates the Michigan landfill site.
She said the deal makes "all applicable federal state and local taxes and fees" Republic Services' sole responsibility. She added any talk of Toronto being forced to pay the entire cost of the increase would be "fear-mongering."
But Republic Services spokesman Will Flower said yesterday that the firm's lawyers are also going over the contract to see whether it is allowed to pass the fee on to Toronto.
He added that $10-million in extra charges would wipe out the company's profits in the Toronto deal.
"That would pretty much flip this thing upside down," he said in an interview from the company's headquarters in Fort Lauderdale, Fla.
Mr. Flower warned that the waste industry would take any such "Draconian" fee hike to court, as it has with other measures to control trash.
It was unclear whether the Democrats' plan, which would give Michigan the highest dumping fee in the United States, would pass through the state's Republican-controlled House of Representatives and Senate.
Matt Resch, a spokesman for Speaker of the House Craig DeRoche, said Republicans shared the Democrats' concerns about trash imports from Canada and other states.
But he warned that such a massive fee hike, which would apply to domestic as well as imported garbage, smelled like a tax increase.
"It's essentially going to become a trash tax on the people of Michigan," Mr. Resch said yesterday.
Mr. Flower said the fee would have drastic consequences for cities in Michigan, such as Detroit, that produce massive amounts of waste. He also said the state's big-car industry would oppose the fees.
http://www.freep.com/news/mich/trash23e_20050223.htm
Here is an article from the detroit free press... a more "American" perspective...
$7.50 to dump a TON of garbage? Charge $50 and tell Toronto to go stuff themselves. I get charged $13.50 a month for my weekly garbage pickup here in Austin. At a conservative 40 lbs per week (we recycle a lot), that works out to about $170 a ton that I get charged. $7.50 is nothing.
I'll take another tack on this.
Landfills in the US are highly regulated and are relatively clean. Tons of clay and dirt are packed in over and under the trash. Trash is a fact of life. Several hundred people are employed with good paying jobs handling out of state and foreign trash. I'll bet most of them are union.
This is just a bunch of feel good legislation for the rats to show us how much they "care".
This is all stuff that Canada does NOT have a deposit for and we're finding in the garbage they're importing.
While we're preventing Canadian trash, I wish we could send the garbage in the governor's mansion back too...
Of course they're talking about the cost at the dump. We have to pay for pick-up, transportation, recycling and po' people that can't pay for the service.
I'll disagree with you on milk jugs just because they are too big to store empties in my garage. I'll certainly agree with return gubernatorial trash back acrosss the border, if they'll take her.
Honestly, taking trash is something I have a hard time getting upset about. I really think it's just the Dems trying to manufacture an issue.
[I]I'll disagree with you on milk jugs just because they are too big to store empties in my garage.[/I]
Don't want to stray from the subject, but where do you store those milk bottles before they are carted away with your trash?
I crush them and throw them in a garbage bag. We go through 4 gals of milk and 2 of OJ a week. Since taking back empties is such a pain in the butt having to stand at that stupid machines, we would probably only do that chore as little as possible, like we do with pop bottles ( we don't drink much pop)
We go through a lot of cans and bottles, especially since we're building and bottled water is convenient. We also buy bottled water (at least we will until the house is finished) because Jackson city water is undrinkable. I won't make ice out of it either.
Yes, the jugs are a pain, but I'd certainly rather pay to recycle them and get my money back than get charged PER BAG for trash, which I think is inevitable. My sister lives in Chelsea -- not only do they have to buy special bags for their garbage, they are charged per bag.
I am single and take out one garbage can of garbage about every 2 months. I amortize it to come out to about $800 for every can.
I think you got me beat. And I don't believe I'd want to go anywhere near a 2-month old can of garbage...
For pay per bag areas, you get a fireplace and burn everything you can. That probably takes care of 50-70% of the trash.
Why doesn't Canada take care of their own trash? It's not like there aren't VAST areas of desolation that could be used for such a purpose. Or does the Crown own all that land and not want it contaminated by the little people's garbage?
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