Kelowna's fee for dumping

Kelowna has recently changed it’s policy and is now charging $5.00 for the dumping of organic material. While this seems innocuous, here is my situation:

My wife and I live downtown, the street has many beautiful, large, old shade trees that produce copious, I mean tons of leaves in the Fall. These trees are on city property,  now everyone loves these trees, I’m sure. I love these trees, I just hate the leaves. I literally raked up over 40 large bags of leaves this year, leaves from trees on city property, not my trees. Did you catch that, they’re not mine! These aren’t my trees, now I don’t even mind so much the raking, it’s good exercise. It’s outside in the fresh autumn smoke. I even gave up smoking tobacco in lieu of inhaling wood smoke while I raked the city leaves.

All I remember from last fall is come home from work, rake the leaves, bag the leaves, breathe the smoke,  haul the leaves. Forty plus bags of city leaves that I had to rake, bag and then haul, on my dime, to the city’s composting site at the dump. I have a 1/2 ton pick up truck, I made at least ten trips to the dump through the fall, that would now cost me $50. (by the way on our street, I didn’t observe the city sweep these leaves even one time this autumn!  Not once.)

For the privilege of doing the city’s job of cleaning up their leaves last season I am out of pocket for my: time, my tools, wear and tear on my vehicle, wear and tear on my lungs, gas to drive my vehicle and leaf bags. But now to add insult to injury, I’m going to have to pay to dump these city leaves? So the city can mulch the organic material and sell it for a profit? Give the tax payers a break. I’ll bet few on city council do their own raking and yard work. I’ll bet no one on city council rakes up 40 bags of City-produced leaves. If you start charging the public to dump organic waste, it will just be all over the city. Empty ravines and empty lots as well as back alleys. If I blow them back onto the street, I’ll get fined?

J. Steffen