City of Lethbridge announces timeline for curbside recycling rollout

The City of Lethbridge says its residential curbside recycling program will be in operation by late May.

On Monday, during a presentation to the city’s community issues committee, the waste and recycling services department said it had confirmed the timeline for the program’s full rollout this spring.

Blue carts will be delivered to single family homes in the city between April 15 and May 10. The first pick-up of those carts will occur between May 14 and May 24.

When the pick-ups start, recycling will be picked up once every two weeks, with garbage collection moving to a bi-weekly schedule too.

Starting in May, residents in single family homes will see an additional $7 per month recycling fee added to their monthly utility bills.

Last spring, 900 homes received blue carts for Phase 1 of the curbside recycling program. The city said Monday, those homes had diverted close to 90,000 kilograms of recyclable material from the Lethbridge landfill.

“When you look at the numbers that we have for the city today — roughly 24,000 tonnes a year is being collected today from the black carts,” said Joel Sanchez, general manager of waste and recycling services.

“We expect that, moving forward, that number can go as low as 18,000 tonnes.”

Each delivery of the residential blue carts will include an information pamphlet. Additional information for users can be found at curbside.lethbridge.ca