Andrea Reimer says that “whenever you increase fees, you run the risk of illegal dumping”.
However, the Vision Vancouver councillor told the Straight she is confident that a new per-unit fee of $20, starting on January 1, to drop off a mattress or a box spring at the city’s South Vancouver transfer station for recycling won’t discourage people from doing the right thing.
“Well, to get it together to get the truck that fits your mattress, to get your mattress in it, to get the time to get to the transfer station, and now you are paying a fee—each of those can be a barrier to paying for somebody,” Reimer, who is also a Metro Vancouver director, said by phone from City Hall. “At the same time, as with the advent of blue boxes or the stigmatization of smoking, the biggest pressure on anyone is peer pressure, right?”
Nicole Steglich, engineer-in-training in the city’s transfer and landfill operations department, told the Straight that, under the current rate structure, mattresses are charged at the garbage rate. The average cost for disposal per unit under this structure is $3 to $4, based on a fee of $82 per tonne for an average mattress weighing 80 pounds, she explained.
Due to the significant cost increase, Steglich said it’s “crucial that residents get the message that there are lower-cost options out there”, such as having the company you purchase a new mattress from take the old one away, as well as donation and recycling—dropping it off at a recycling facility as opposed to the transfer station.
At the transfer station, “the $20 per unit is either going to cover recycling for the majority of mattresses that are going to be recyclable, or, for those that are grossly contaminated [such as with bedbugs], then that $20 per unit is going to cover burial at the Vancouver landfill,” Steglich said by phone.
Due to the South Vancouver facility’s proximity to Richmond, Burnaby, and New Westminster, Steglich is urging residents across the region to call 604-RECYCLE or visit www.metrovancouverrecycles.org in order to assess their options.
