Sarnia transferring recycling collection responsibility

Who pays for recycling in Sarnia is changing as of July 1, but residents won’t notice a difference in collection, a city official says.

Sarnia and neighboring municipalities like Point Edward are in the first third of eligible Ontario municipalities switching to producer responsibility for recycling collection, said Sarnia engineering and operations general manager David Jackson.

“The goal of it is to incentivize the producers, now that they bear the full cost, to then find ways to use less packaging, or packaging materials that are easier to recycle,” he said.

Regularly scheduled collection in Sarnia continues with Emterra for the next two years, he said, until all municipalities’ recycling becomes the responsibility of Circular Materials, a national not-for-profit created by Costco, Loblaw, Nestle and other plastics and packaging producers, to manage and pay for recycling requirements.

There’s also no impact to garbage or yard waste collection, he said.

“They’re transitioning the whole province over three years and so generally, the (municipalities) going in the first couple of years, (Circular Materials is) just maintaining service,” Jackson said.

Once all municipalities are switched over, there may be a move to standardize collection contracts across the province, he said.

“But at this point, there’s no change in the service.”

Currently, the city receives funding from the province and revenue from recyclingbalanced against blue box collection and processing costs, Jackson said.

The revenue from recycling has fluctuated dramatically in recent years, he said, but generally municipalities have been subsidizing recycling program costs.

“So, getting out of the recycling business does result in cost savings,” he said.

For 2023, the city budgeted $300,000 to $400,000 in savings — for the latter six months — that council put toward lowering residential tax bills, he said.

How much will be saved annually going forward isn’t clear, Jackson said.

“We’ll likely have a similar review as part of the 2024 budget process. . . and council will have to debate what we do with those potential savings,” he said.

Provincial organic waste collection is expected to start in 2025, and city officials have recommended putting savings toward the cost of setting up that systemand potentially a food waste digester.

“We are internally starting to prepare for that and will likely be starting some public consultation on development of that program sometime within the next year,” Jackson said.

The recycling switch also has no impact on city hall staffing, he said.

One person locally was responsible for overseeing recycling, yard waste and garbage collection and process, Jackson said.

“Now, they’ll be looking after garbage, yard waste and starting to develop our organics program,” he said.

Anyone with questions about recycling, after July 1, should contact Emterra at 1-888-597-1541 or [email protected], or Circular Materials at 1-855-354-2772 or [email protected], instead of the city , Jackson said.

“We look forward to delivering a seamless transition of recycling services for the residents of Sarnia,” said Allen Langdon, Circular Materials CEO, in a news release.

“As the province transitions over the next few years to a full producer-responsibility framework, Ontarians can expect to have a convenient, consistent, and effective recycling system that will improve recycling rates, benefitting people and our planet.”