Swatar residents have complained to the council the number of skips available is not adequate to avoid the mound of garbage that often accumulates near existing skips.In an effort to encourage recycling, the Birkirkara local council is rejecting calls for more skips in the locality despite garbage accumulating at different parts.
Residents at Swatar have been complaining that not enough skips are available as a result of which many were resorting to dumping waste near existing skips already full to capacity.
Not being bound to supply skips for non-recycled waste, the local council preferred to make good use of CCTV cameras, insisting that more skips would only serve to hamper efforts to encourage recycling.
One resident told this newspaper yesterday he had informed the council about waste spilling onto the pavement on more than one occasion. He felt that CCTV cameras would not solve the problem.
Executive secretary Neil Spiteri said the council was aware of the situation but felt that increasing the number of skips was not an option in view of the efforts to change waste dumping habits.
“As a locality, we have been putting a lot of effort into encouraging people to recycle, so if we do provide more skips we would only be hindering this,” Mr Spiteri said.
As a locality, we have been putting a lot of effort into encouraging people to recycle
He pointed out that the CCTV system across the locality would serve to penalise those violating waste dumping regulations. “We have just installed [CCTV cameras] in Swatar but we have had this system in different parts of the localities and, so far, it has worked,” Mr Spiteri added, acknowledging that some residents were, at times, still resorting to dumping waste outside the skips despite the cameras.
The council acknowledged that having mountains of waste near the skips was a problem but it was adamant having more such containers would not solve the problem, he said.
“We sometimes get shop owners who place boxes full of waste by the skips. So there’s no point adding more skips because it’s proper enforcement that is needed,” Mr Spiteri pointed out.
He said the council had for months asked for help to provide more green wardens to monitor the area because it could not afford hiring more.
Birkirkara was last month awarded the ‘sustainable practices award’ by waste recovery scheme GreenPak after it managed to reduce waste dumped in black bags by 37 per cent while increasing recycled waste to 45 kilos per capita.