What?
Curb side pick-up (165,000 homes) west of Yonge Street to Humber River will be privatized, plus litter pick up in parks and sidewalk vacuuming.
Etobicoke has had private garbage collection for 16 years. This represents the first phase in a three-stage plan to contract out garbage collection throughout the rest of the city.
Currently, most garbage collection is provided by the City whose employees are represented by CUPE 416. CUPE’s contract with the City guarantees many of these jobs. The City can’t contract out the garbage collection services across the entire City because any staff person who lost a job due to privatization (as many as 1,255 positions) would have to be given a job elsewhere in the City for equal pay. However, 300 part time and temporary jobs are not protected and will be cut when the services are privatized.
Why?
City says contracting out could save $6-8-million a year and will stop future strikes
Timeline:
April 2011: City’s public works and infrastructure committee’s votes 4 to 2 to seek quotations for curb-side collection west of Yonge Street
May 2011: City Council votes 32:13 to contract out garbage collection between Humber & Yonge
October 2011: GFL (Green For Life) Waste and Recycling Solution Company awarded winning 7-year +
contract to provide garbage collection
Mid 2012: new garbage collection services estimated to be in place
Concerns:
- Potential savings overestimated
- Contracting-out may cost less in the short-term but within a few years is similar or higher than the cost of public waste collection
- Al Rosen and Associates, Litigation and Investigative Accountants, have reviewed the City of Toronto’s cost estimates related to their proposed contracting out and found them seriously
flawed (May 2011 – CUPE 416 press release) - Does not adequately account for the cost of monitoring (Toronto Environmental Allowance)
- Private contracts often require municipalities to pay for a set tonnage, which means the city could end up paying for garbage that was not collected
- Private waste industry is one of the most concentrated markets in North America. Private collectors hired in some jurisdictions have simply kept jacking their fees, knowing that there’s no competition to challenge them for the contract. NOW
- In Ottawa and Hamilton, in-house collection was determined to be cheaper (CUPE 416)
- Toronto’s garbage collection is already cost effective
- The City of Toronto has lower costs of solid waste collection per tonne than all the other regional municipalities in the GTA – all of whom contract out this work to private collectors
- Per tonne rates have been consistently below the provincial average (Sanger)
- A survey of recycling producers across Canada by the University of Victoria found that public recycling and composting operations were on average 16% less costly per tonne that private operations across Canada and 40% less costly than those in Ontario
- The City’s waste department generates revenue from user and dumping fees and the sale of recyclable material.
- Impact on waste diversion (recycling and composting) is unknown
- Anecdotal evidence that privatization has a negative impact based on experience of York Region.
- City states that Etobicoke (which already has private garbage pick-up) recycles 1% more than the rest of the City.
- Will eliminate about 300 good city jobs
- Private workers are paid less and don’t get benefits like sick days and holiday time
- Lower quality service?
- City received 2% more complaints from Etobicoke residents about garbage collection last year than it did from residents living between Etobicoke and Yonge St.
- Customer service complaints are much lower in Toronto than in Ontario cities with private collection.
- In house garbage collection allows for more flexibility
Additional Resources/Detailed Reports:
CUPE/Toby Sanger report: Garbage In, Garbage out: the real costs of solid waste collection
Toronto Environmental Alliance report: An Environmental Perspective on Privatizing Waste Collection
NOW magazine article: Refuse to lose – 10 reasons why private garbage is a trashy idea. Available at: https://www.nowtoronto.com/news/story.cfm?content=179027