The town of Fort Frances is circling September 9 as the date for this year’s household hazardous waste collection day.
This is also the first year of hazardous waste being transitioned to producers to manage.
One change could be with the grant money the town gets to offset the costs of running a collection day.
Interim Chief Administrative Officer Travis Rob says municipalities have been lobbying for more money from Produce Care, one of the main funders.
“They fund X number of dollars per kilogram of material, but it’s been stagnant for a number of years. It doesn’t factor into the mobile costs related to having an event, posting an event,” says Rob.
“How the grant is going to work this year, this is going to be our first year post-transition, and it’s going to be interesting to see how the money shakes out. By rights, we should be getting more money post-transition than we were pre-transition. But really, the rates that they’re paying for the products hasn’t changed. The list of products that are classified as hazardous waste and are eligible for funding hasn’t changed.”
The Miller Group out of Winnipeg is the company that is proposed to collect the hazardous materials.
Fort Frances and Dryden have joined together on the contract, with the cost to Fort Frances running about $46,000.
Rob says that will be partially offset by a grant from Stewardship Ontario of about $17,000.
The contract will come before town council at their regular meeting on Monday.
