Extra garbage pickup to cost Calgarians
Calgarians will soon have to pay for any extra garbage that doesn't fit into a black cart, similar to blue ones used for recycling.
City council endorsed a plan, dubbed "tag-a-bag," on Monday, that will see the expansion of a pilot project, currently used by 15,000 households, to the rest of the city by 2012.
Each household will receive a black cart, which holds 240 litres or about four garbage bags, for their waste. Each garbage bag that doesn't fit into the cart will require a tag that will cost $2.30.
If the garbage bag doesn't have a tag, the city will refuse to pick it up. The city estimates it will sell about one million tags per year.
"What we have before us is a carefully thought-out program that is about taking us quite frankly from laggards a few years ago to within leading by 2013, 2014," said Ald. Brian Pincott.
The pilot project, which was being tested in six communities, found that 13 per cent of the 15,000 homes taking part generated extra trash that didn't fit inside the black carts.
The tag-a-bag initiative is part of the city's target of diverting 80 per cent of residential garbage from the landfill by 2020.
Read more: http://www.cbc.ca/canada/calgary/story/2010/04/12/calgary-garbage-tag-bag-bin-fee-council.html
