Anyone travelling through French River will soon notice blue boxes at the curb.
Curbside recycling is coming to the community in a bid to make it more compliant with incoming 2025 provincial legislation.
"Part of that requirement is to meet a five per cent contamination rate. Our current system averages about a 40 per cent contamination rate so it's very much off the target for 2025," said French River CAO Marc Gagnon.
Gagnon said they tested the system for a year with approximately 900 residents and it received great success.
It's still too soon to say whether they'll transition to curbside garbage, but staff is looking into it.
"There will still be some costs associated, we'll be eliminating the transfer site recycling station so there's a cost recovery there,” he said.
“Ultimately the goal is to meet those contamination requirements and because of the new legislation, that whole cost will be at the producers (those who produce the recyclable materials) and not at the municipal taxes.”
While it's too soon to say and not counting the $100,000 cost to set up the program, Gagnon is hoping it will be pretty comparable for the community overall when it comes to what the town will pay.
Residents were each provided two blue bins to try and buy into the program in advance of it starting.
"When you're introducing something different there will always be challenges, there's always people who don't like change. We're hoping that ... hence why we did the pilot program first to test it out within a certain reach of households and we received positive feedback and actually some feedback from the people on when are we going to get our service," he told CTV News.
The program will impact 2,300 residences, both permanent and seasonal.
They've also put in place plans to address those who live on islands or where curbside collection might be difficult.
"We're asking that people be patient, that they let this play out a couple times and that the recycle be out at 7 a.m. Once you get used to a certain schedule where things get picked up then you'll be able to adjust the time where you put things out at the same time," he said.
The town's goal is to have everyone up and running by the end of June.
