LEWISTON — Mayoral candidate Ben Chin said Wednesday he is against a city plan to charge a price per bag for curbside trash collection, based on feedback he’s gotten from residents.
“I’m opposed to changing public goods into fee-for-service systems,” Chin said at news conference in front of Lewiston City Hall. “I don’t believe we should fund our Fire Department on people whose houses burn down; I don’t think we should fund police with sky-high parking tickets.”
Councilors in July approved a $30,000 educational effort on the program with an aim of putting it to a public vote.
City Administrator Ed Barrett said the education program has been approved by the City Finance Committee, but it is not expected to begin until after the election.
“Everybody in the city would be able to listen to what it actually is, and then make a decision,” Macdonald said. “This has to go to a referendum, and if the people of Lewiston want it, they’ll have it. If they don’t want it, they won’t vote for it. But we supported a plan to get information out there.”
Chin said that vote and the educational effort shouldn’t be necessary.
“I basically know how the public vote would go,” Chin said. “This thing would go down in flames if there is a public vote. I think we don’t even need to waste the time and money on having the public vote. Anybody that has knocked on any doors in any neighborhood knows how people feel about this.”
The pay-as-you-throw plan is designed to boost city recycling while cutting trash costs paid from property taxes. Residents would buy special trash bags at local stores. City crews would only collect curbside trash left in those bags.
City recycling would continue to be free, and the paid-bag program would let the city stop paying for curbside trash collection with property taxes, a roughly $1.2 million savings. That savings could be used to pay down the city’s tax rate, reducing it by about 66 cents for an entire year of the program — between $66 and $99 in property taxes on a $150,000 home.
The bags would likely sell for about $2 for a 30-gallon bag and about $1.25 for a 15-gallon bag. All residents would be able to leave their trash in the special bags.
Councilors agreed to pay WasteZero $30,000 to explain to residents how the program would work. If the city adopts the program, WasteZero will forgive the $30,000 to help launch the program and then stay on to help provide customer service.
Chin said he would rather see the city promote recycling other ways.
“There are carrots and there are sticks,” Chin said. “One way is to offer rebates to encourage people to recycle. This is similar to the way we do bottle returns now. If you are really into this penalizing idea, there are options out there to penalize people who don’t recycle. But if you are really trying to change behavior, you want to target that behavior. You don’t have to go through some new bag program to do it.”
Councilors voted 5-2 for the education program at their July 15 meeting, with Councilor Kristen Cloutier absent and Mayor Robert Macdonald voting in favor. Councilors Leslie Dubois and Mike Lachance voted against it.
Cloutier, reached via email on Wednesday, said she supports the education program to give residents good information about the plan.
“There has been a lot of push-back from the public regarding (pay-as-you-throw) since that initial proposal was put forth,” Cloutier said in her email. “Some people have come to conclusions and made a decision at this point without having all of the information.”
Cloutier said she thinks the proposal is a good way to reduce trash costs and tipping fees at Mid-Maine Waste Action Corp., the Auburn incinerator that takes Lewiston’s trash. Ash from MMWAC’s incinerator is dumped in Lewiston’s landfill.
“We need to consider what our future contract with MMWAC might look like and what our capacity at the landfill will be,” Cloutier wrote. “My preference would be that we move forward with the public education program and then let the voters decide.”
Election Guide
Benjamin Chin, Luke Jensen, Robert Macdonald, Steve Morgan and Charles Soule are running for Lewiston mayor on Nov. 3, 2015. Learn about more candidates and issues in our Election 2015 guide.
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