Beaver River changes tracks on garbage

Rising fees sees commission decide to haul to Ryley landfill

Beaver River Waste Management has decided to dump its agreement to haul waste to Evergreen’s landfill by Lafond in favour of hauling to Ryley, according to the CAO for the commission.

Roy Doonanco, CAO for Beaver River, said, “I think the Evergreen commission has been aware that we weren’t overly pleased with the constantly increasing tip fee rates.” Tipping fees at Evergreen had increased by $5 each year over five years to $65 a tonne for Beaver River, compared to Ryley’s current rate of $39.95 a tonne, he said. Even after factoring in higher transport fees to haul waste to Ryley, which is another 159 kilometres southwest of St. Paul, “it’s still cheaper to haul to Ryley,” Doonanco noted.

It was an unanimous decision from Beaver River’s board to make the switch, he said.

Beaver River represents communities such as the M.D. of Bonnyville, the Town of Bonnyville and the City of Cold Lake. When the commission first decided to haul trash to the Lafond-area landfill in 2007, former board chair of Evergreen Robert Bouchard called it a “win-win” situation for Beaver River and for local ratepayers. In an interview with the St. Paul Journal at the time, he noted the decision would make the waste facility more economically viable, since it was expensive to operate and required more tonnage to operate efficiently.

Since then, Evergreen has been faced with rising costs to operate the landfill and build additional cells, opposition from Lafond-area residents to expansion plans, and covering legal fees in response to an appeal of the decision to increase the classification of the landfill to accept more waste.

According to County of St. Paul Coun. Glen Ockerman, who chairs the Evergreen board, although there has been some talk from Beaver River about the change in its operations, there has been no “official notice” or written communication about the decision. He declined to comment until there had been official notice.