Council Recycling Day

[silentC]

About 6 months ago the local council introduced a new recycling system. In the past, you could take your empties to a depot in town which was run by the local Primary School P&C to raise money. The depot was open all the time and you could take as many empties there as you pleased.

In their wisdom, the council introduced the yellow bins AND made the practice of taking the bottles to the local depot illegal, thereby ensuring that the waste contractor would get all the recycling fees.

Apart from the fact that this has nipped a good little earner for the P&C in the bud, there is another problem. In the past, we could go to the depot every day if required. Now the council only picks up fortnightly. As you can see by the attached photo, this is creating a huge problem at our house.

[Wongo]

Good on you Silent. This is one way to help our water shortage.

Drink beer not water.

Cheers:cool:

[Driver]

You've been taking "Avagoodweekend" a bit too literally, mate!

[silentC]

Well, you see we came off this liver diet last week and the missus and I felt in need of a bit of a drink to celebrate.

Actually a 'mate' of ours sent my wife this photo suggesting it as a landscaping design for our new house! The nerve. We don't even like Oettinger. Dab's a much nicer drop :D

[journeyman Mick]

It would be interesting to see test the legality of council's decision to make collection by others illegal. If, of course you could be bothered with all the fuss and stress that involves. I'm drawing near the end of a battle with a section of the Queensland Fire and Rescue Service with regards to their treatment of volunteer rural fire fighters, very tiring (which is why I haven't been around here much) but hopefully will be satisfying ultimately. There's been a lot of questions asked and politicians involved and they're about halfway through an inquiry at the moment.

Mick

[silentC]

It did get up my nose when I read the letter that went out to all the ratepayers. Here you have a community organisation doing something for our kids and the council comes along and robs them of a heap of funds to satisfy the terms of a contract with some waste mob from Sydney.

Yes it would be interesting to see what they would do and what law you would actually be breaking. Incorrect disposal of waste I suppose. Trouble is, no-one could be bothered because it's too easy to just walk out and dump it in the yellow bin.

The other thing is that not only does the P&C miss out, and therefore are required to raise money in other ways, which ultimately we pay for in the form of raffle tickets etc, but we also pay for the recycling service, so we get hit twice.

[journeyman Mick]

Might be worth sending a letter to the council and asking them to justify their position and clarify what law(s) would be broken and what penalties would apply. You are in effect donating goods to the P&C for them to sell, can't see how thay can make that illegal. Letters with questions in them can be powerful things. My letter has seen some changes to operating procedures already (inquiry not even completed yet) and has a few people running around trying to cover their asres. Mind you it did have 108 :eek: questions in it and I c'cd it to all the local MPs and workplace health and safety :D (Doesn't pay to get me annoyed;) ) Depending on the fines involved I'd be thinking about getting local media involved and then telling the council you will be donating glass bottles to the local P&C at such and such a time. Have the media present and challenge the council to send an officer there to fine you. A lot of hassle I know, and a lot of these things go unchallenged because the powers that be know that most people will complain and do nothing else. I'm in "warpath" mode at the moment though because sometimes you've just got to draw the line.

Mick

[silentC]

Good idea Mick, but I might wait until I've got the final inspection done on the house before I stirring up trouble ;)

Maybe I can incite someone else into doing it :D

[ozwinner]

Good idea Mick, but I might wait until I've got the final inspection done on the house before I stirring up trouble ;)

Cant you get an independent inspection done, we can here?

Al :confused:

[silentC]

Yes you can but you have to nominate the PCA at the time of your development application - too late for us now. Also, I spent a lot of time building a relationship with the council bloke (read "pissing in his pocket") and I don't want to throw all that away.

Actually, I doubt it would make a lot of difference to him as he is a "calls a spade a spade" type of chap. But I'd rather keep a low profile for now.

[ozwinner]

Invite the council and the school mums over for a up, then let them fight over the emptys.
Make sure you get some piccys to post here.:D

Al :eek:

[oges]

You could always build a shed using the bottles as the 'bricks'

[wombat47]

Did my son and his mates visit for a weekend?