Waste Collection Service Five Months On

By John Freer

It has been five months since the blue rubbish bags disappeared from outside homes around Thames Coromandel, in their place a new wheelie bin and a second bin for food waste.

As expected the introduction of the new kerbside refuge and recycling collection service under a new contractor in Waste Management, in September last year, had its share of supporters and detractors – the people that made it happen have now had their say.

CFM interviewed Thames Coromandel District Council staff members, Mo Imtiaz and Anna Stephens.

Both agreed the introduction of the new contract was one of the biggest tasks either had handled in their respective careers.

The contract is a 10-year agreement between council and the contractor. It will be first reviewed in September.

Council told us that when something new is introduced, it takes a while for things to embed and adjust to meet service requirements. At the same time, there are also industry changes that are occurring continually.

“So, once the contract with our new solid waste operator Waste Management has been in place for a full year, we’ll review the service and industry changes, to see if any adjustments need to be made to these services.”

However, changing a community’s collection day is logistically difficult, council saying if Pauanui, for example, was switched to a different day, another community, likely a much larger one, would need to take its place.

“Also to note is that, under the previous contract, service on the eastern seaboard was provided over two days. If we returned to a two-day system, we’d need to potentially triple the fleet of collection vehicles, at a huge cost to ratepayers. And that fleet would then be inactive for the other three days of the week.”

Open the link below to hear the interview.