Garbage, recycling to take center stage in Whitefish
Garbage and recycling — including discussion of mandatory curbside recycling with monthly charges — dominates the Whitefish City Council work session agenda on Tuesday.
The council meets at 5:30 p.m. at its temporary conference room, 1005 Baker Ave. in the Stampede office building. The meeting is on Tuesday due to the Labor Day holiday.
Various options for animal-resistant garbage containers and recycling will be discussed, with input from North Valley Refuse.
Imposing new bear-resistant container requirements in Whitefish would affect the current pricing in the solid waste contract that North Valley Refuse currently has with the city of Whitefish, the company advised in a letter earlier this year to the city.
“We are no longer able to obtain the cart that we were using in the current contract for a bear-resistant cart rate and also, they are not fully automated as the Kodiak [brand cart],” North Valley Refuse General Manager Roger Bridgeford stated in the letter.
The bear-resistant container collection fee with the recycling company providing the Kodiak cart would be about $15.75 per month.
The council will discuss a proposal from North Valley Recycling to take over the monthly billing services for garbage collection.
New downtown locations for recycling facilities also are being considered because the current recycling bins behind City Hall have to be relocated to make way for construction of the new City Hall and parking structure.
One option is to lease space in the parking lot south of the Craggy Range restaurant. Another plan is to use large, roll-off recycling containers in the city snow lot near the railroad tracks.
No formal decisions may be made during a work session.
At the regular meeting that begins at 7:10 p.m. the council will consider a resolution maintaining the $8,000 per unit cash-in-lieu payment in connection with affordable housing.
According to numbers provided by the Whitefish Housing Authority, a payment-in-lieu amount of $8,000 per market rate unit makes up 100 percent of the difference between an affordable mortgage and a market rate home mortgage.
The council will discuss a proposed land transfer with John Hagg for land by the Sky Park Bridge and wastewater lift station. In the exchange the Hagg family would receive a 3.24-foot-wide easement along one lot and a 3.24-foot strip of land along another lot. The city would receive an equal amount of easement and property.
Features editor Lynnette Hintze may be reached at 758-4421 or by email at lhintze@dailyinterlake.com.