Ottawa's new bag tag policy will charge $3 for extra garbage bags

Bag tag: Pay more for extra garbage Ottawa to vote on bag tag program to charge residents to get rid of more trash on the curb. CTV's Leah Larocque reports.

Ottawa residents will soon have to pay an extra $3 a garbage bag if they go over their limit for the year under a new bag tag program designed to encourage waste diversion and extend the life of the Trail Road Landfill.

City staff outlined the proposed changes to Ottawa’s curbside garbage collection on Thursday, looking at short-term changes to boost diversion and recycling at households across the city.

The main proposal in the Curbside Waste Diversion Strategy is to introduce a new "partial-pay-as-you-throw" system for municipal garbage collection, which would require residents to pay more for putting extra garbage bags at the curb.  Under the plan, each home would receive 55 bag tags a year as part of the Solid Waste user fee, and every item of garbage will require a tag in order to be collected.

"We are treating waste more like a utility," Nichole Hoover-Bienasz, program manager of long-term planning, told councillors and the media

If homeowners use up the 55 bag tag allotment during the year, they would be required to purchase additional tags at $3 each for garbage collection.

The partial pay-as-you-throw program would require:

"Tags would be wrapped around the neck of the garbage bag and stuck to themselves. This would allow the tag to remain on the bag and make it easily visible for our collection staff," Hoover-Bienasz said.

"Residents choosing to set out their garbage in a container would need to wrap the tag around the top bag in the container. Households would also be able to use smaller bags to bag their waste versus having to buy larger bags, so long as the top bag in the garbage container has a tag on it."

A garbage container would count as one item of garbage, regardless of the number of bags in the container.

Ottawa currently has a limit of six garbage items every two weeks for households. Statistics show an average of 2.1 items are set out by households every two weeks, with 74 per cent of household setting out two or fewer items.

It will cost $3.5 million in one-time capital costs to launch the bag tag system, with an ongoing operating cost of $1.5 million a year. Staff are proposing hiring two staff members to support education and enforcement of the new garbage bag limit.

The city estimates the partial "pay-as-you-throw" program would reduce garbage tonnage by up to 19 per cent in the first year, and up to 28 per cent by the fifth year. It's estimated the new bag tag program will increase waste diversion rates by up to six per cent and increase recycling tonnage by up to 19 per cent.

Many other municipalities use a bag tag system, including Gatineau, Carleton Place and Kingston. The city of Gatineau requires tags for any bags that do not fit in a home's grey bin, up to a maximum of five extra bags per week. A sheet of five tags costs $2.50.

The city has been looking at several options over the past two years to extend the life of the Trail Road Landfill. As of 2019, the dump in Ottawa's south end had 30 per cent remaining capacity, and was expected to run out of space between 2036 and 2038.

"Siting and developing a new landfill or implementing an alternative residual waste management technology could cost taxpayers between an estimated $300-450 million and could take up to 15 years to become fully operational," Public Works General Manager Alain Gonthier said in a memo to council on Wednesday.

"Changes to waste-disposal habits are required in the short-term in order to defer the need to begin the process to site a new landfill or alternative residual waste management facility in the short term."

Gonthier says community participation in waste diversion programs are required to give the city enough time to move forward with the future disposal option chosen by council, comply with provincial regulations and diversion targets and reduce the amount of unnecessary waste sent to the landfill.

The province is requiring municipalities to divert more waste from landfills by setting a target for curbside households to reduce and recover 70 per cent of food and organic waste from its waste stream by the end of the year. The city is currently at a 60 per cent capture rate, according to Gonthier.

Other options the city looked at include clear bags for garbage, firm garbage item limits, material bans on recyclable and organic material and reducing the garbage item limit for households.

The Environment and Climate Change Committee will vote on the Curbside Waste Diversion Strategy on June 5, with Council set to debate and vote on the proposals on June 14.

If approved, the city of Ottawa would implement the partial-pay-as-you-throw program by the spring of 2024.

Hoover-Bienasz says the city of Ottawa will be putting a plan in place to monitor and enforce illegal dumping.

"We know it exists today, and we know that this is a top concern that has been raised by members of council as well as your residents."

The city is looking at partnering with businesses to sell the garbage bag tags once the program is launched.

"We pay enough"

Some Ottawa residents quickly expressed opposition to the proposed new bag tag system for garbage collection.

"It should not be up to taxpayers; we pay enough," Doreen Visser said. "I don't think they should be charging people extra money for their garbage. People are already going through hard times."

"Prepare for random garbage dumped all over by many residents," Will Davie said. "My house would be buying tags even with three overflowing recycling bins and an almost overflowing green bin."

Norman Brown said, "There's going to be people who embrace it 100 per cent, 1,000 per cent and there are going to be people who ignore it."

However, Don Timpson says it is a "good idea."

"I look at some of the garbage that is out there and I can’t believe it. Where did they get it all?" Timpson said.

"It isn’t just this week, two weeks later - it will be again. I don’t know where they get it all."

Will Egan said, "Obviously we want to save room in the landfill and reduce reuse recycle. But at the same time it will affect people who use more trash."

"You can be more conscientious about how much trash you throw out. If you put some sort of 'sin tax' on something, a price on pollution in a sense. “

CITY OF OTTAWA: CURBSIDE WASTE DIVERSION POLICY

With files from CTV News Ottawa's Ted Raymond