Town considers shift to provincial recycling program

EAGLE STAFF

Councillors on Monday night were expected to again consider a provincial agency’s proposal to take over collecting certain recyclable items.

Officials with SK Recycling offered the town two options as part of the provincial government’s move to have companies pay for collecting and recycling their packaging material.

Bins containing recyclable paper, cardboard and packaging material bound for Saskatoon stand along Sixth Avenue East before their regular pickup on Friday. Town councillors are deciding whether to accept a Sk Recycles offer to manage this service starting in June or wait until 2028. Photo by Ian MacKay

In the community-led program of the second phase of a transition that began with cities, smaller centres may “continue to provide curbside and/or multi-family collection services” for SK Recycling starting on June 1, or have that organization take over collecting recyclable paper, tin, and plastic in 2028.

“If we were to move to SK Recycling in 2026, they take over paying for recycling as it is right now without charge to us,” Amanda Bors told councillors during their Dec. 1 regular meeting. Bors, the town’s acting chief administrator, had seen a program about the proposal and spoken to Kelly Goyer of Saskatoon, the official in charge of it.

Under the community-led plan, SK Recycling would continue having Loraas picking up local material, and the town would stop receiving a Multi-Material Stewardship Western grant, Bors said.

The town would continue receiving the grant until June 2028 if it continues under its current contract with Loraas Recycling in Saskatoon, she said.

“And then we’re almost forced to move to SK Recycling or say we don’t want to take part in a recycling program,” she said.

“It sounds good up front,” Mayor Trevor Hay said. “It’s just what’s going to happen… in 2028” if the town has to exchange the collection bins used now for ones another contractor would provide.

The stewardship grant of “just under $50,000” covered much of the approximately $59,000 the town paid for the service last year, Bors said. She thought SK Recycling would handle any bin exchange.

The town might have to break its year-to-year contract with Loraas, but she thought SK Recycling would assume it, Bors told questioner Kimiko Otterspoor.

Information posted on the SK Recycling website says that the provincial Environment Department issued “updated regulations” for handling packaging and paper on March 31, 2023, in the Household Packaging and Paper Stewardship Regulations, 2023.

“The regulations call for a full extended producer responsibility (EPR) program, whereby producers will become operationally and financially responsible for the collection, transportation, consolidation, processing, and marketing of household packaging and paper,” the website explains.

It promises to provide material to distribute to residents, including “the full recycling material list” and a “collection guide” example.

Plastic packaging banned from bins includes a wide range of material, from totes and squeeze tubes to lumber and construction wrap, plus any plastic attached to something else, such as paper or handles made of cloth, rope, or ribbons.

Rosetown qualifies for the second phase of the transition because it has a population of fewer than 3,500 and already has a collection program connected with SK Recycling, which was known as Multi-Material Stewardship Western until November 2024.

Members of SK Recycling include “retailers, restaurants, importers, manufacturers, distributors or wholesalers, and any organization that supplies packaged goods and/or paper and flyers to Saskatchewan residents,” the website says.