Guest column: Windsor-Essex needs to start taking waste diversion more seriously

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As a resident of Windsor-Essex, I know our community is made up of hard-working individuals who care about our families, neighbors and environment.

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But some days we are so busy, we don’t even have time to take the recycling out before we leave for work.

As our population grows, we’re going to have to put more effort into keeping waste out of our landfills if we want to truly fight climate change alongside the rest of the province.

Looking at Windsor-Essex’s waste management history, little has changed in the 34 years since the blue box program started in 1988. We took the time out of our busy lives to vote for people to care about waste diversion, yet it appears they have very little progress to show for it.

I feel It’s time we hold decision-makers accountable for the implementation and success of waste diversion programs in Windsor-Essex.

In 1993, Windsor-Essex adopted their Solid Waste Management Master Plan with a goal of diverting 50 per cent of waste from its landfills by the year 2000.

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Based on their own annual report, Windsor-Essex had only diverted 32 per cent of its waste in 2020. Not attaining this goal 20 years past its due date demonstrates a lack of governance by those responsible for implementing changes in waste management.

The Region of Waterloo’s annual report for the same year boasts a 63 per cent diversion rate. This difference in fun rates proves the 50 per cent goal locally should have been met by now. After decades of stagnation, it’s time our decision-makers introduce successful waste diversion strategies.

The Essex-Windsor Solid Waste Authority (EWSWA) 2011 Master Plan Review and Update noted weekly recycling pick-up and green bin programs as some of the reasons why other municipalities ranked higher in waste diversion during that time.

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We should be outraged by the fact that they’ve been aware of potential waste diversion improvement methods for years, yet have seemingly chosen to do little about it.

The EWSWA even priced out a green bin program back in 2014, but the cost to run the program stopped them from implementing it. This will be less of an excuse next year when blue box programs start to transition to full producer responsibility, since companies producing recyclable waste will take on the financial costs of recycling.

According to the meeting minutes from January of this year, the EWSWA now has plans to initiate a green bin program by 2025.

For those unfamiliar with the program, a green bin is a large plastic or metal container used for collecting kitchen, plant or animal wastes. It includes wastes like plate scrapings, vegetable peelings, meat and bones, uncooked food and cut flowers.

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The hard work of those involved in planning the green bin program should not be discredited, but it has taken years for us to get to this point and we are still three years away from launching the program.

Considering how easy it has been for EWSWA and its partners to avoid the backlash of not reaching its goals, residents need to hold them accountable through the implementation of the green bin program and success of other waste diversion programs if we want to keep our landfills at a manageable capacity.

Implementing new waste diversion programs strengthen not only our ecosystem, but our economy, as well. Ontario’s Food and Organic Waste Framework: Action Plan states that in comparison to disposal, 40 per cent more jobs are created when 1,000 tonnes of organic and food waste are collected. I believe that would be an easy feat for Windsor-Essex.

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Despite all the promising and relevant information about waste diversion programs, EWSWA and its partners appear to be in no rush to make changes to the current system. What is holding them back?

If our planet has any chance of combatting climate change, everyone needs to be doing everything they can to fight against it — and this includes diverting waste from landfills.

Whether we feel we have the time to sort our recycling or put our food waste into a green bin, we need to make time to influence EWSWA into creating and sustaining programs which make it easy for us to divert our waste.

It is time we hold our decision-makers accountable for improved waste diversion strategies. Our community and planet can’t afford another 34 years without any progress.

Allaina Lucier is a registered nurse locally and graduate student in the Master of Public Health program at the University of Waterloo