Saddle Hills County is now using the County of Grande Prairie’s landfill in Clairmont, as the last day of its municipal waste contract with Tervita was Friday. A three year agreement is now in place, but Saddle Hills Director of Engineering and Infrastructure Jim Uhl says it’s intended to be a long-term solution.
“I think it will work terrifically. We’re looking at modifying our fleet of equipment even to accommodate the little longer distance but they’ve been very supportive; the agreement has terms and conditions that we’re actually very happy with.”
Residents will also be able to take their garbage to the dump, and Saddle Hills will get the bill. As for the other members of the Central Peace Waste Management Commission, Birch Hills County has its own landfill to fall back on.
County of GP Environment Manager Steve Madden says he’s also been in talks with the Village of Rycroft and the Town of Spirit River for similar agreements. He says they’re more than happy to help.
“That’s the point of municipalities is to work together and make sure everybody’s successful because we all have ratepayers to work with. It’s a small amount of refuse that they’re talking about, so it’s really a very small item in the bigger picture of what we really do at Clairmont landfill.”
He adds that they’re already set up to deal with additional traffic, and are looking at improving access in 2016.