Newmarket woman videos Green for Life employee dumping waste, recycling into same truck

'I was livid,' resident's complaint leads to town issuing fine to GFL for contamination

Yorkregion.com
May 22, 2019
Teresa Latchford

Ashley Arkeveld is encouraging Newmarket residents to pay close attention to the way their garbage and recycling is collected.

The local mother was driving her children to school earlier this month when she found herself driving behind a Green for Life (GFL) vehicle. She watched in disbelief as the employee dumped garbage, recycling and green bin contents into the same truck.

“I was livid,” she said. “Residents spend so much time sorting their waste, teaching their children to sort, and I watched a whole street’s environmental efforts wasted.”

Her disbelief turned to anger and she pulled over to shoot a video of what she was witnessing. She claims she confronted the employee, who replied he was doing it to prevent congestion on the one-way street.

“It can be overwhelming to try to reduce your environmental footprint but recycling is the one thing people feel they can do that is simple, but seeing this makes it feel like a farce,” she said. “Once garbage is mixed with recycling it is contaminated and all ends up in the landfill.”

She recorded the video on Botsford Street, dropped her children off at school and returned to follow the truck. She witnessed the same behaviour on Timothy Street before heading home to file complaints and post her disappointment on social media.

“I’m not one to post things on social media, but I felt this was something the taxpayers deserved to know,” she said. “It just made me incredibly angry.”

She sent the video to the Town of Newmarket and GFL, asking if this was common practice and stating her discontent.

“I went through proper channels,” she said. “I was very impressed at how fast the town responded.”

The Town of Newmarket confirmed it received her complaint.

“When a complaint is received, the town’s waste program administrator will investigate, oftentimes working with the GFL operations team to find a solution,” Newmarket’s Public Works Services Director Chris Kalimootoo said. “In addition, the town and York Region conducts waste audits regularly on our contractors to verify that appropriate processes and procedures are being followed.”

The town, along with the other five northern York Region municipalities that share a contract for waste disposal, meets with GFL to discuss current issues, trends and campaigns to assist with educating residents on the importance of properly disposing waste, recycling, organics and yard waste.

All complaints are documented and discussed during the northern six municipalities' quarterly meetings. GFL’s contract also includes incentives to ensure customer service and finish times are kept to an acceptable standard. All aspects of performance get reviewed regularly.

GFL currently has a contract until 2025 to handle waste disposal for Newmarket, Aurora, King, East Gwillimbury, Georgina and Whitchurch-Stouffville. The amount for the contract is subject to a confidentiality agreement and cannot be released, according to Kalimootoo. However, he did confirm that there are liquidated damages clauses for cross-contamination in the contract, but the town had never had to use it up to this point.

“GFL was fined $1,000 as noted in our contract for liquidated damages for cross-contamination,” he added.

While the fine is better than no action at all, Arkeveld feels the dollar amount would be just a drop in the bucket for a large business like GFL. However, she is encouraging all residents to pay attention to their garbage collection because several $1,000 fines would add up quickly and get the point across.

GFL did not respond to email requests asking if this was a common practice, if the employee was disciplined or if the employee was instructed to put trash and recyclables in one truck to avoid “traffic congestion” on the one-way streets he was servicing.

If residents have a complaint about their waste collection they are encouraged to contact the town at 905-853-5193 or info@newmarket.ca or GFL directly at 1-866-421-5625 or WasteLine@gflenv.com.