Simcoe County council will have to deal with the messy waste debate about bulky item collection.

The county’s Waste Management Subcommittee recommended axing the program, but this week, the county’s Corporate Services Committee argued about it – and was evenly split over the fate of the program that collects up to five pieces of furniture, televisions and computers per pick-up. The items are then sent to a county landfill site.

The waste sub-committee recommended killing the program, to save on landfill capacity, and instead recommended residents take these items to their nearest county transfer station, where they could be sorted and recycled.

But county politicians were evenly split over that proposal – and county councillors will have to weigh the arguments and decide the fate of the bulky items.

Tiny Township’s Deputy Mayor George Lawrence said eliminating the program will only make illegal dumping in roadside ditches worse.

“If bulky items are going into county forests and your ditches, shame on your residents,” Corporate Services Committee chairperson Coun. Doug Little told him.

“We’re trying to make the residents look after their own stuff, instead of having someone else look after it for them.”

Essa Township Deputy Mayor Terry Dowdall noted that he sees trucks full of bulky waste heading to a dump when it’s closed, and heading back empty, and Oro-Medonte Township Deputy Mayor Ralph Hough noted people looking to get rid of their bulky items already leave them outside the gates of old, closed landfills – which forces the county to clean up anyway.

“This dump has been closed for years, yet every time I go by, there’s a slew of garbage dumped at the gate. That costs the county,” he said. “The more you cut back (service), the more you will run into it.”

Tay Township Deputy Mayor Michael Ladouceur added residents might not have the patience to line up at a transfer station on a Saturday. “It’s very discouraging,” he said, of the waits that are already 1.5 hours. “Now you’re uploading even more by asking residents to bring (bulky items) there.”

The bottom line, said Adjala-Tosorontio Mayor Mike MacEachern, is the county is proposing a service cut.

“I see this as a reduction in the level of services to residents. This issue isn’t about not allowing bulky items to be collected. It’s just about making it harder for residents to get them to the landfill,” he said.