City to extend landfill site contracts

City council has agreed to extend by two years the contracts for three companies working at the city’s landfill.

City council has agreed to extend by two years the contracts for three companies working at the city’s landfill.

With the exception of Coun. Dave Stockdale, who was absent from Monday evening’s meeting, council was unanimous in voting to extend the contracts for McInroy Disposal, the Raven Recycling Society and Arctic Backhoe for two years starting July 1, when each of their current five-year contracts are set to end.

While Arctic Backhoe operates the dump, McInroy runs the transfer station and Raven deals with the gatekeeping at the site.

The contracts will remain the same at $310,331 for Arctic Backhoe, $74,452 for McInroy and $58,742 for Raven, with the three companies already agreeing to the extensions.

City staff recommended that council go ahead with extending the contracts due to a number of issues around waste that the city will be dealing with over the next two years.

“Over the next couple of years, a number of initiatives are being done which could impact the scope of work required to be performed under the various contracts, so it is necessary when tendering contracts that the scope of work can be clearly as possible identified such that companies can bid effectively and avoid scope changes or disagreements on interpretation during the term,” it was noted in a report presented to council last week by acting public works manager Terry O’Toole.

Among the issues that will be looked at, O’Toole pointed to:

• completing a waste audit that could identify improved opportunities to divert waste;

• changes in Raven Recycling and other recycling companies operations that could impact waste diversion;

• new scale, remote video camera and data transfer changes that could change landfill operations such as operating hours and commercial business access to the facility;

• composting improvements that could see expansion into the commercial sector;

• the territory’s and city’s review of the impacts of taking in waste from communities outside the city’s boundaries;

• landfill permitting currently before the Department of Environment and the Yukon Environmental and Socio-economic Assessment Board;

• expanding the items collected as household hazardous waste; and

• the Department of Environment’s review of the way waste is collected and disposed of as well as its consideration of revising the refund system for beverage containers and the review of making waste producers responsible for its collection and disposal.