The Council has now published a table showing the amount of waste recycled/composted each quarter for the last 5 years.
The table (click here) reveals that the lowest level of composting and recycling recorded occurred during the period Oct – Mar 2014.
This coincided with the period when the Labour led council stopped green waste collections
Liberal Democrats have renewed their calls for action to increase recycling in York as figures confirm recycling levels fell last year and the Labour run York Council missed its green targets.
Former Coucnil Leader Andrew Waller joins Richard Hill in opposing the closure of the backfield Lane recycling centre in 2012
It’s target was to increase recycling to 48%.
Meanwhile, the amount of waste sent to landfill increased from 53% to 56% over the same period.
The council’s target had been to reduce this to 52%.
Last year it was confirmed that landfill tax in York was set to cost the council £4million a year.
The Labour Council courted unpopularity by ending winter green bin emptying 8 months ago, while also deciding to only provide a free collection service for one bin.
The Council also closed the recycling centre in Beckfield Lane in 2012.
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Over 800 residents living in Upper Poppleton are set to benefit from a new trial enabling them to recycle other types of plastic packaging for the first time.
From 20 June until 29 August residents in Upper Poppleton will be able to recycle plastics including yoghurt pots, margarine tubs and fruit trays along with the usual plastic bottles and tin cans.
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Due to unforeseen circumstances we are currently unable to collect glass recycling from streets with narrow access.
— CYC Waste Services (@CYCWaste) May 29, 2014
For a list of streets and recycle banks, please visit http://t.co/YdtMG5QvMv We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause residents
— CYC Waste Services (@CYCWaste) May 29, 2014
City of York Council is reminding residents that all households must place their new garden waste sticker on the lid of their green bin by Monday 5 May to ensure continued collections.
Over 600 properties in the Clifton area of the city were given a helping hand to re-use and recycle even more of their waste and as a result participation in the recycling collections in this targeted area increased by around six per cent.
The campaign ran over a period of 12-weeks and provided incentives to encourage even more people to recycle and re-use.
Prior to the start of the campaign the council carried out an assessment on how many residents already recycled in the targeted area. This included a doorstep survey which enabled officers to talk to residents direct about any problems that they were experiencing and how they could help to resolve these.
The York Council is distributing a leaflet to each household explaining how they plan to schedule waste collections over the Christmas period.
Bins in Foxwood 2012
Last year the service deteriorated in to chaos during the same period.
This year some recycling collections are being cancelled. There will be no collections on New Years Day but there will be a “catch up” on the following Saturday.
The Council have issued the following advice.
The York Council is distributing a leaflet to each household explaining how they plan to schedule waste collections over the Christmas period.
Bins in Foxwood 2012
Last year the service deteriorated into chaos during the same period.
This year some recycling collections are being cancelled. There will be no collections on New Years Day but there will be a “catch up” on the following Saturday.
The Council have issued the following advice.
Council performance stats click to access full report
A Council report has revealed that the amount of waste going to landfill in the City is significantly increasing.
As a result York taxpayers face a £3,918,960 bill – up over 17% on budget forecasts.
The fall in performance comes only weeks after a change in collection arrangements brought chaos to some streets in York.
The position is likely to deteriorate further over the winter as the Council is stopping collecting green waste altogether. The winter months accounted for around 18% of this type of waste last year.
The fear is that most of this will now go to landfill.
Historic recycling rates in York. Click to enlarge
During the period when the Liberal Democrats led the council the amount of recycling and green waste sent for composting had substantially increased each year.
Now, against a background of delays on the longer term Allerton Park waste treatment project, prospects look increasingly bleak for both taxpayers and environmentalists in the City.
Asked, at the last Council meeting, to apologise to those residents whose bins were not emptied on time, Cllr Levene refused to do so.
Instead he claimed that only 0.12% of collections had been missed.
He conveniently forgot that 90% of residents did not have changes to their collection days.
Last Christmas some bins weren’t emptied for nearly 3 weeks and, although there have been fewer missed collections this week, the holiday season could being more problems.
Green waste collection stops at the end of the month.
Bins in Foxwood
Cllr Levene protestations were undermined by a fellow Cabinet member who, in response to a separate question about delays in answering at the Councils call centre, said,
“the significant increase in calls week beginning 9th September were due in the main to the waste collection changes affecting a large proportion of residents in York.
Clearly original estimates of resources needed to meet demand had to be re-evaluated once the real impacts were known, and then adjusted”.
The Cabinet member went on to say that
“We aim to answer 80% of our calls within 20 seconds with 95% of calls being answered”.
This compared to the actual performance, in early September, when average waiting times were 2.5 minutes with 40% of calls being abandoned.
