Business group wants garbage disposal fee hikes halted before Metro Vancouver plan vote

The Business Council of B.C. wants Metro Vancouver to halt approval of its long-term solid waste management plan, which goes to the outgoing board on Friday, citing garbage disposal fee increases it says are unjustified.

Under the plan, Metro Vancouver would raise disposal fees paid by haulers by nearly five per cent a year over five years. Denise Mullen, the council's director of environment, sustainability and Indigenous relations, said the justification for the increase is unclear and that it is "roughly two to three percentage points above inflation."

Mullen also objected that the board that would approve the plan includes directors who were not elected in the Oct. 17 municipal elections. She said Metro Vancouver is "the planner, regulator, manager and price setter" and wants an independent "value for money" review. "For businesses, those cost increases flow through to services they provide Metro Vancouver residents. It's a cascading effect," she said.

The main dispute is the waste generator levy. The Competition Bureau of Canada said in 2019 that Metro Vancouver's fee bylaws "could have significant negative effects on competition" and on innovation in waste management. Metro Vancouver now says the levy applies to all facilities, including those outside its jurisdiction, if the waste came from the region, and the levy is charged on top of whatever private operators charge.

Metro Vancouver's own report says a parallel private disposal system would move large portions of commercially collected garbage out of the public system and cost the region tipping fee revenue. That commercial garbage supplies about 65 per cent of tipping fee revenue, more than $100 million a year. "They do say they have addressed it in words but it's hard to find the substantiveness of the words," Mullen said of the bureau's concerns.

Metro Vancouver's response to Mullen's objections is not in the material, and the outcome of Friday's board meeting was not available.