Toronto poised to expand private garbage collection
Mayor to announce plans to privatize waste pickup east of Yonge St.

TheStar.com
Jan. 10, 2017
Betsy Powell

Toronto Mayor John Tory will announce Wednesday he’s pushing ahead with private garbage pick up east of Yonge St., launching the next phase in an ongoing battle over who provides city services.

Tory will be backed by a new staff report that’s expected to recommend the city focus privatization efforts on District 4, encompassing all of Scarborough, while leaving collection in District 3, including the downtown core, with unionized staff.

Tory will make the announcement in rookie Councillor Stephen Holyday’s Ward 3 in Etobicoke, where a mix of service providers has been collecting garbage since 1995.

“For the mayor, this is about providing the best service at the most affordable price,” Tory spokesman Don Peat wrote in an email.

"This isn't about ideology, it's about value for money." He would not discuss the contents of the report or details of Tory’s announcement.

Last fall, Councillor Jaye Robinson, a Tory ally and chair of the public works and infrastructure committee, said one of the options she wanted the city to consider for outsourcing was a “managed competition,” which would allow the union to bid on work alongside private companies.

The City of Toronto is divided into four districts for daytime residential curbside collection. Districts one and two use private-sector workers, districts three and four use unionized city workers. In 2015, it cost $19.7 million to haul garbage in District 3 and $14 million in District 4, according to a staff report.

District 3 has higher collection costs because it is filled with older neighbourhoods, row housing, one way and narrow streets and on-street parking, city staff say.

CUPE Local 416, which represents 500 solid waste employees, has been waging a public relations campaign, called Kicked to the Curb, in an attempt to hang onto its remaining workforce.

Workers have been collecting waste east of Yonge in a “competitive and efficient manner,” and Tory is treating them “like garbage,” CUPE representatives told a news conference at city hall last month.

The new staff report also comes a year after an another report, under the former manager for solid waste, concluded a “mixed model” of garbage collection provided the best value for Toronto and contracting out additional service would not save money.

“The best value and lowest risk to the city of Toronto at this time is to continue with the current model,” the September 2015 report said.

Last November, Robinson asked solid waste staff, under new leadership, to take another run at assessing the garbage landscape, citing “significant changes” including a new collective agreement with city workers.

Deputy Mayor Denzil Minnan-Wong, who quarterbacked garbage privatization expansion in the city’s west end in 2012, said private operators there have “been delivering high quality service at a significantly reduced price.” He added “the union wants to kick taxpayers to the curb.”

The city is currently saving $88 million over eight years due to outsourcing, Minnan-Wong said.

But Councillor Gord Perks, one of Tory’s staunchest critics on the left, said the mayor and his allies’ “ideological bent” for outsourcing hurts municipal workers and jeopardizes the reliability of important public services.

“I’m not going to lie down on this one, and I know many, many members of the public and many of my colleagues understand the value of decently paid work and having the public control of public services,” he said Tuesday.

Toronto is also already “past the point” of having enough resources to step in and “fix things” when inevitable problems with private garbage contractors arise, Perks said.

“The only way we can guarantee a robust system, so that you know when you put your recycling it out it will be taken away that day, is if the city has an adequate sized workforce and number of trucks.”