City of Nanaimo staff will take a closer look at the recycling habits of those in the region, in a bid to cut down contamination of blue bins. (Alex Rawnsley/NanaimoNewsNOW)

By Alex Rawnsley

UNDER INSPECTION

Inspectors rummaging through Nanaimo blue bins to cut curbside contaminants

Jun 3, 2023 | 5:32 AM

NANAIMO — Straight education hasn’t had the desired effect, so the City of Nanaimo is beefing up their approach to recycling contamination.

New blue bin inspectors began work Friday, June 2, walking ahead of the collection trucks to try and remove any items which aren’t supposed to be there.

Taaj Daliran, manager of sanitation for the City, told NanaimoNewsNOW the workers will be in high-visibility vests with the City of Nanaimo logo on them.

“They walk before the trucks go there, they go to the residence, they check the carts, they open it. If it’s full, they have to take some material out to see what’s underneath. If they find items that shouldn’t be there, they take them out. They do that before our trucks go and collect those routes.”

If there are too many contaminants found by the inspectors, the bin will not be collected.

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The inspectors will leave more educational information with offending homes in a bid to encourage more careful recycling in the future.

At this stage, enforcement will just extend to the inspections, however, fines are possible.

“We have in our bylaw a fine already established. We can do that, we haven’t done that and we’re trying not to do that. Our focus while we are enforcing it is serious education.”

Daliran added executing the fine structure would require more time and work from the inspectors to document the contaminants, as well as conversations with the residents to prove the City took all necessary steps prior to fining, and the fine was warranted.

The main infractions involve either throwing completely unrecyclable items into the blue bins or putting in items which should go to a depot instead.

Recycle BC has given the City a mandate to improve its contamination rates or risk penalties.

Audits in recent years have resulted in Recycle BC asking the City to improve their public education, as well as implement this inspection program.

Future missteps will cost taxpayers.

“If we don’t achieve the targets, for every truck that goes to Recycle BC, they do their inspection and audit, if they find the contamination rate is above the target, they will charge us $5,000,” Daliran said.

He added one B.C. municipality racked up $105,000 in fines through two months towards the end of last year.

Information about what can and cannot go into a blue cart recycling bin is available on the City’s website.

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