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LETTER: Make recycling and trash disposal easy and affordable

Reader Robin Goldsbury: "European countries discarded the RDCK method 20 years ago because it didn’t work."
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We all want what is best for the environment. By making recycling difficult and trash disposal expensive the environment issuffering. In the RDCK dump fees are now so prohibitive many can’t afford to pay them. Recycling takes hours out of one’slife waiting in line, then disposing items one at a time. This is crazy!

Under the guise of a reduced carbon footprint, the RDCK is dramatically increasing the footprint, and creating a horrible mess in the woods. Drive up any backroad and you’ll find bags and bags of garbage, discarded furniture, construction waste and more. By making it difficult to put cardboard into the recycle bins, people are going back to burning their boxes. Businesses have started putting their plastic, tin and glass into regular waste because paying an employee to fill the recycle bin one item at a time is a big cost. And, the holes in the bins are so small that buckets and other items don’t fit!

This letter is calling on the RDCK to look at the reality of the situation and put in a convenient, affordable system that will work. Consider the East Kootenay: Trash disposal is covered within the tax structure and recycling works well. European countries discarded the RDCK method 20 years ago because it didn’t work.

The RDCK has created an expensive trash industry, and made recycling more difficult and time consuming. The result ispeople are disposing their waste anywhere but the dumps and recycling depots. This must change, and the change must be inRDCK policy.

Robin Goldsbury, Balfour