Marlborough’s wheelie-bin overstuffers put on notice

KIRA CARRINGTON - Local Democracy Reporter

Has your recycling bin ever been bursting at the seams? Have you ever struggled to close your rubbish bin’s lid despite standing on it to squash the contents?

If that’s you, and you live in Marlborough, the Marlborough District Council has you in its sights.

The council’s new waste minimisation bylaw, due to come into effect on Monday, includes a three-strikes process ending with the confiscation of a household’s kerbside bins.

The first strike would be a notice attached to the offending bin, explaining why it was rejected and tips for correct use.

After a second strike, the council would write directly to the household as a final warning.

After a third strike, the offending bins would be confiscated and waste services to the property would be withdrawn until a fee was paid and the household pledged to use the bins correctly.

Council solid waste manager Mark Lucas told the assets and services committee on Tuesday that several properties had had their kerbside waste rejected up to five times.

“They’ve been identified, and we’re actually gonna go knock on their door,” he said.

Every household whose waste had been rejected would receive a letter on Friday explaining the requirements for each bin and the new consequences for non-compliance, he said. “The idea is that the first part of the education is direct to the householder at that address.”

Lucas said the council has been communicating with households whose circumstances meant they needed a larger bin. “A family, they had a member of the family on dialysis ... I’m not sure if you’re aware but the dialysis products come in a pretty large cardboard box,” he told councillors.

“They couldn’t fit the cardboard boxes in the 140-litre recycling bin. “So we’ve upsized that to 240L to make sure that [the box] fits, mainly to find a model that we know is going to work when we have people on dialysis.

“Then if anyone else comes to us, we can just say to them, ‘Here’s your waste bin, but we were going to give you the bigger recycling for that purpose.’”

Lucas also said a lid and cap collection scheme would be rolled out to all regional transfer stations. “We’ve done negotiations with the local [waste] contractor JBL,” he said.

“JBL’s going out there once a month to each of the transfer sites to pick up the whiteware, the e-waste and the hazardous waste.

“So they’re just gonna grab the [lid] bags out of the bins and bring them into town ... at no cost.”

Plastic lids would be sent to Future Post, a Blenheim recycling company that turns recycled plastics into durable fence posts.

Metal caps and lids would be sent to Phoenix Metal Recyclers.

LDR is local body journalism co-funded by RNZ and NZ On Air.