FAQs
- On a residential property, each separately habitable unit, flat, house or apartment.
- On a commercial property, each separate space intended to be used as a shop or other retail or wholesale outlet, other than that used by the owner.
- In an office block, each space intended to be used as offices that is or would be used by a different business from the owner.
- With the closure of the Levin landfill, there is no longer income being generated by the site to help offset solid waste funding costs. There are also added costs for landfill remediation and debt repayment.
- Kerbside recycling costs have historically been funded by Council borrowing money rather than via rates. This is proposed to shift to be fully rates funded.
- Promote reuse of waste
- To reduce waste disposal to landfill
- Enable data sharing with private waste collectors
- Enable data sharing with private recycling companies
- Provide the community with access to recycling services
- Ensure households and business have access safe disposal of general waste
- Provide environmentally safe disposal of hazardous waste
- To reduce illegal waste dumping
- To provide waste minimization education to schools
- To educate the community in waste minimization
- To work collaboratively with other territorial authorities, central government, industry, and other parties to improve waste management and minimization in New Zealand
- Provide high impact low cost waste diversion initiatives
What's a SUIP?
A SUIP is a Separately Used or Inhabited Parts (LGA term) and is one of the factors that may be used by councils in calculating liability for Targeted Rates.
Examples of Separately Used or Inhabited Parts include:
What's a Targeted Rate?
A Targeted Rate is any rate (other than a General Rate) targeted at users or beneficiaries of a particular service.
Targeted Rates are used for solid waste, water supply, swimming pools, libraries, and representation and community leadership.
What's a General Rate?
A General Rate is everyone pays for the service based on their land value as the service benefits the entire community, eg the provision of emergency management services, maintaining our award winning parks and reserves, sports and playgrounds, public halls and buildings, public toilets and street beautification.
Why is the total of the three new proposed solid waste rates much higher than the single rate that is currently being charged?
The overall rates funded portion of the solid waste activity has increased significantly, the key reasons being:
What happens to our waste?
Council provides Solid Waste (rubbish) disposal facilities for residents and visitors to our district through a kerbside bag collection service and provides Waste Transfer Stations in Foxton and Shannon. This waste is being disposed of at the Bonny Glen Landfill near Marton, which also takes the sewage sludge from the Levin Wastewater Treatment plant.
Does our recycling go to landfill?
Our kerbside recycling goes to Awapuni Material Recovery Facility (run by Palmerston North City Council) to be sorted into various categories and then bailed for shipment and local processing. Much of the HDPE (High density polyethylene) plastic is recycled by Aotearoa NZ Made. Cardboard and paper are reprocessed by Oji in NZ for reuse. Our glass bottles are also sent to Awapuni for shipment to Visy in Auckland, where the glass goes to be made back into new bottles.
Where does my organic waste go?
Green waste can be disposed of at the Foxton or Shannon Transfer Stations. It is currently mulched by a local composting contractor in Foxton and used as a soil conditioner.
What are we doing with organic kerbside collection?
Much of the kerbside waste contains a sizable portion of organics. Since the organics is mixed with general waste the waste goes direct to landfill. Council will consider whether to introduce a separate organic waste collection to reduce the amount of organic waste that goes to landfill.
I am rural why do I pay for solid waste?
While you might not have access to the bins and kerbside collections, rural residents still have access to the waste transfer facilities, and community mobile recycling stations (MRSs). These are funded from the general rate. Council has a statutory role to encourage or residents including rural residents to utilise the environmentally safe disposal of waste through waste transfer stations.
What is a waste management and minimisation plan?
The government requires all councils to produce a waste management and minimisation plan (Plan). The Plan helps us to comply with legislation and access waste levy funding from the government. The Plan is a policy document that considers central government and community direction on what areas of waste management and minimisation our community will direct resourcing to.
If kerbside recycling is taken away, will we have access to more recycling centres in our towns? Have we considered how this will impact our most vulnerable who can’t necessarily get to recycling centres?
Creating more community mobile recycling stations (MRSs) is a possibility. The cost to operate these MRSs would not necessarily be at a cost appreciably less than the current kerbside collection price.
Due to the unsupervised nature of these MRSs they are prone to abuse by way of the recycling being heavily contaminated with non-recyclable waste material. They are also very difficult to get consent approval due to the 24/7 noise from the dropping of glass bottles into the bins. Not many neighbours want one of these MRSs next door to their property.
No MRSs will be able to eliminate the impact to those who cannot get to an urban MRSs even one that is only a mile away.
If we do need to increase the amount of recycling centres in the district, what would be the cost for this in comparison to what kerbside recycling costs?
The cost of MRSs is estimated to be over $1.4 million. The cost of kerbside is at $1.9 million. This present kerbside cost would reduce further if we stopped providing the service to the small number of rural residents who presently receive this service. (And who presently do not pay for this service)
Can we just burn our rubbish?
Burning of rubbish in the urban zone that recreates a nuisance and often contains harmful toxins (plastics) and so is a prohibited activity. This air pollution would be reported to the regional council for investigation and prosecution. The burning of waste materials in rural areas is a permitted activity. There are certain restrictions on what cannot be burnt. See Horizons website for more information.
If rural residents who have kerbside recycling have the service removed what alternatives do they have for recycling?
There are six Mobile Recycling Stations available to receive recyclables. There are also three waste transfer stations to take recyclables to.
What are the goals of the WMMP?
How are people supposed to do the right thing with their rubbish when it costs so much to use the transfer station?
Council encourages residents to reduce their waste to landfill by providing a fortnightly kerbside collection of recyclables. For those that do not have a kerbside recycling collection there are community mobile recycling stations and waste transfer stations that accept recyclables. Council also encourages residents to use its rubbish bags which can be brought and used only when residents require them. The price of these bags is set at a low rate to encourage residents to support the service and direct more recyclable waste into the Council provided services. If residents fully participate in these services resident waste disposal costs will reduce.
Who decides the gate rates of the transfer stations?
Gate rates are determined by Council and reflect actual costs to dispose waste. Migration of out of district waste must also be controlled. Our district gate rates must provide a disincentive to reduce the impact of out of district waste overwhelming our district transfer stations.
Why do we have to pay for rubbish collection, rubbish bags, transfer station fees, and solid waste in our rates?
Council has a statutory obligation to ensure waste is collected regularly and disposed of in a sanitary manner. Council provides these services to meet these obligations.
Do you think that we will have more fly tipping if we remove kerbside recycling? And what is the general cost to council to manage fly tipping each year?
An increase in flytipping would not normally be linked to the removal of kerbside recycling. Most residents will do the right thing for their community and purchase another Council bag if they need more rubbish bags. Flytipping is normally confined to an age and demographic. Flytipping can be controlled by properly resourcing the Council Compliance Team. Case studies prove that flytipping will reduce in cost and frequency when people know they will be held to account for their non-compliant actions. Council flytipping costs are presently estimated to be under $100k per year.