Demand claim filed for refund of waste and recycling charges
By Lethbridge Herald on February 23, 2023.
Editor:
At this point in time like most residential households, the concerns are the increasing costs, the financial burden to the bank account, like food, household debt, and utility fees which keep increasing such as waste and recycling collection fees.
We would like to speak about your utility bill and the Recycle Collection item. Like most citizens with COVID or health problems, utility rates were not of top concern. I have to admit to being a person who checked his monthly bills it was not a concern. One day recently I was checking the payables and looking at my City utility statement something was not right with the Recycling collection charge rate of 0.298 a day which is over $9 monthly.
The reason for concern, and should be of all residential households, our group monitors City utilities including electricity distribution tariffs. The reason for our concern about the Curbside Recycling collection fee is on Nov. 25, 2018, the acting City Solicitor presented to city council the new Waste Bylaw 6146 merger of Waste and Recycling and referred to the 2018-2027 CIP program with the wording “which includes a net increase of $7 to the monthly residential recycling collection customers the waste and recycling charges effective 2019.”
A later recommendation by the general manager of Waste & Recycling to change black cart service from weekly to bi-weekly – a net projected change to a $5.50 blue cart fee, never happened. Our group has filed a demand claim to city council on behalf of residential households for the period of January 2021 to January 31, 2023, for a $4 per month refund caused by incorrect rate charges. The monthly residential curbside recycling collection fee should be $5. To date, city council has not responded, which is typical.
The Alberta Municipal Government Act Section 43 (1) states a person who uses, receives, or pays for a municipal utility service may appeal a service charge, rate, or toll made in respect of (b) has not been improperly imposed. As I stated we have filed a claim in the best interests of the residential households with city council. Your involvement could be for the record to e-mail or phone 311 with an objection to the $9 rate and say you want the $5 rate. The rate for the organic curbside collection will be $5, the same type of service.
Ken Ikle
Spokesperson for the Committee for Residential Utilities
9-8
thank you for noticing the discrepancy, and, for acting on this on behalf of each of us that has had our pockets picked since the recycling program was absconded from the private providers by the city. i wonder, is there anything that could be done with regard to the garbage collection fees, which appear to have remained the same but with just half the pick ups?
It is important that the residential citizens phone 311or e- mail the Mayor and council ” you object to the $9.00 fee Recycling fee and want the $5.00 fee” this will help move the25 month claim forward thks
Will not a 311 call just get buried? People need to go to the city website and fill out a contact form. These are apparently directed to council. An email is now apparently old school and just goes no where. Apparently a contact form is more official and gets more attention? Know any one who can make a presentation to the correct city committee- standing committee or whatever they are called? You know the ones that have 2-4 city councilors on them? So that by a 2-1 vote an issue can just disappear? If an issue does not pass as a recommendation to council as a whole,I think it disappears. Or just receives a ,” received as read “and is filed under disappear.
m13 any manner of of filing a citizen objection 311 notes the objection and forwards..
We have had experience with the new style of Govt committees the procerdure’s to legislative committee to compile and forward to designated committee ,for approval, the action by the committee of wiping out the presentation.. The style of governance is the corporate structure, is we the Corporate citizens are the Corporation we hire a group to act on our behalf to properly govern on our behalf if they do not then we go into a situation like Lac laBiche or Strathmore, Coaldale a investigation of improper financial procedure or irregularities. We asked the Residential group to back up the claim their action recorded if we must proceed to municipal authority. The Local problem with this City Council must start with the Corporate citizens..
Yes m13, the City Council complaint form is excellant. What the citizens should know Is they pay above the monthly recycle collection fee, $3.96 monthly debt payment and $3.66 monthly tipping fee for recyclables to The Material Resorting Facility MRF,the building they own and pay for
m13 tried the Mayor and City Council Complaint form again the last time used no response. made a copy to send out and if a appeal on claim is required if asked on how many citizen complaints we can show legal body.
tks
What the City Taxpayers should know the City Manager operating budget request which sets the property tax rate, included a operating expense for curbside collection of organic material is $3,686,000, dollars for a Residential Organic program that has not started completely and $1,055,992, dollars for ICI compost operations the Landfill cell #7 over 20,000 tonnes of organic, which will probably be deposited now in the new Residential paid curbside $10 million Organic facility.
The City Council approved you pay.
With all this how would over $4million increase your property taxes?