By Marcus Uhe
Results in the City of Casey’s community satisfaction survey placing it lower than state average for the appearance of public spaces did not surprise Cranbourne North’s Paul Smith.
Mr Smith is fed up with the piles of hard rubbish left around the City, particularly outside the townhouses on his street, Tulliallan Boulevard.
Recently he said that two piles of rubbish featuring food scraps and broken glass were left unaddressed for “at least three weeks”.
He believes the problem has gotten worse over the last couple of years.
“Every time a tenant leaves, they just dump everything they don’t want on the nature strip,” he said.
A change to the council’s waste collection policy has contributed to the problem, according to Mr Smith.
Previously, the council assigned streets a regular hard rubbish collection date. But in 2011 the council introduced a booked waste collection service with a maximum of two collections per property, per calendar year.
Mr Smith believes this is inadequate for the high-density living spaces the townhouses provide, and called for the council to introduce a more proactive approach.
“You can’t have 40 houses putting out hard rubbish twice a year. That’s 80 collections alone.
“Go back to collecting hard rubbish twice a year on specified dates to clean up the municipality.
“It’s a disgraceful mess in nearly every street with piles of hard rubbish.”
His frustrations with the collection service are compounded by the poor maintenance of parks and gardens that plagued the municipality following extreme weather conditions in late 2021.
Issues with Covid-19, staffing and equipment experienced by contractors responsible for the open spaces resulted in 1600 outstanding requests from jobs received between October 2021 and January 2022, according to an update provided by the council on Tuesday 12 April on its website.
“The municipality looks the worst it’s ever looked,” Mr Smith said.
“The Covid-19 excuse doesn’t stand any longer.
“I don’t have a problem paying rates if there’s adequate service coming with it. The rates have gone up but the service is decreasing.”
Rates increased by 1.75 per cent in line with the State Government’s imposed rate cap.
In the City of Greater Dandenong, a mobile security camera was installed at a problematic area for the illegal dumping of rubbish on Stud Road, following years of advocacy from councillor Lana Formoso.
At a council meeting on Monday 8 August, Cr Formoso attributed the camera to a reduction in waste at the spot.
“Interestingly, no one has done anything there since the cameras have been placed there,” she said.
“So obviously people are aware that they are doing the wrong thing.”
Manager sustainability and waste at the City of Casey, Michael Jansen said the current model of collection offers “flexibility” to residents as it means their waste can be collected when it is most convenient to them.
He also said the policy is more cost-effective than what was used previously.
“Booked collection services are cheaper than blanket collections, as only booked services are paid for, rather than being charged for every household regardless of usage,” Mr Jansen said.
Of the problem on Tulliallan Boulevard, he said the council’s Litter Prevention Officer had been made aware of the area.
“Many of the piles in the neighbourhood are correctly booked by residents for collection, which occurs sometime during the allocated week and therefore may be on the nature strip for several days.
“We are aware that sometimes unbooked or dumped piles occur both from local residents and others randomly dumping in the streets.
“Information is provided on council’s website on hard waste bookings and we have recently written to all real estate agents in Casey, encouraging them to provide information to residents in their rental properties on how to book hard waste collections.
“Reports of unbooked hard waste are investigated by our Litter Prevention Officers.”
On its website, the council states it requires at least five days’ notice to collect the rubbish.
