SUTHERLAND Shire Council has replaced its twice-yearly clean-up service, following a flood of complaints in January.
The council resolved at a meeting on Monday to change the biannual rubbish pick-up to a twice-yearly ‘‘on-call’’ collection.
Residents will now need to call the council to arrange a time for the removal of their excess rubbish, which can only be placed on the kerb the night before its scheduled collection.
No limit was placed on the amount of rubbish each household could dispose of.
The change followed the disastrous clean-up over December and January, which saw some streets waiting up to two weeks for kerbside rubbish piles to be cleared.
Some desperate households resorted to ringing talkback radio in an effort to embarrass the council into hurrying along the clean-up, which was hampered by staff shortages and truck breakdowns.
Some rubbish piles were so picked over by scavengers by the time they were removed that the company contracted to receive the waste now wished to sue council because the haul was so devalued.
During Monday night’s debate, several councillors condemned the most recent clean-up and claimed it had made the shire look like Beirut.
‘‘This dreadful system, it is a scar on our community,’’ mayor Carol Provan said.
She said Burraneer Bay Road in particular had been ‘‘a disgrace for a long time’’ earlier this year while councillor Steve Simpson said the shire was ‘‘a pigsty’’ during the last collection.
But other councillors took a softer approach to the former scheduled twice-yearly collection.
Councillor Lorraine Kelly said she believed the clean-up was ‘‘a shire tradition’’.
‘‘I think the shire thrives on its twice-yearly clean-up,’’ Cr Kelly said.
The new service, which will be trialled for 12 months before being reassessed, comes at no extra cost to households as it will be covered by the ‘‘waste levy’’ paid by all shire ratepayers.
Should the council have dumped the pick-up service?
