Parksville city council has voted to adopt the Regional District of Nanaimo’s waste container requirement service establishment bylaw.
The bylaw, once implemented, requires all businesses, multi-family dwellings and institutions have separate bins for garbage, food waste and recycling, or a contract for post-collection sorting.
It is essentially the same as the three-stream collection approach currently used with the RDN’s single-family curbside program, according to the regional district.
Coun. Mary Beil said she was pleased to see the bylaw coming forward, although it is “just a first step at this time” and will still need to go through various approvals before implementation.
“It is an expansion of the separating of materials that would otherwise go into landfills so that we can reduce the amount of landfill in the whole area,” Beil said during council’s April 3 meeting.
The RDN board introduced and read the bylaw three times at its March 12 meeting.
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“It is a very progressive step and I appreciate the RDN effort on this,” said Mayor Doug O’Brien.
Coun. Martin said that based on the RDN’s five-year financial plan, the cost seems to goes up gradually at first, but is doubled by 2028.
The plan shows a Solid Solid Waste Services tax requisition of $1,744,591 in 2024, which is projected to increase to $3,466,902 in 2028.
O’Brien said the RDN works on a cost recovery plan for all of their solid waste programs and the numbers are a projection in their five-year plan. The Solid Waste Services tax requisition is reviewed annually for accuracy, according to the RDN.
In May 2023, the province granted the RDN the additional power to, via bylaw, require owners or occupiers of property to have separate containers for different types of solid waste and recyclable material.
Council voted unanimously in favour of adoption.