Where do you stand on the island controlling its own waste and retaining green waste for the island's use?
Sue
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Candidate
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I campaigned, along with a lot of other Waihekeans, to keep the waste contract with Cleanstream. Control over our own waste and recycling activities is central, in my thinking, to developing a local culture of respect for the environment and our relationship to it. It is not just an economic argument.
The Unesco Biosphere Reserve proposal requires us to act more responsibly towards our environment and, particularly, to look at the way we run our lives to reduce the impact that has on the natural environment. The waste issue is a central part of that. It also has implications for local employment.
If anything can be done to terminate the contract with TPI, I would be in favour of the Board doing what it can to support that.
- Colin Beardon
Hi Sue,
Living on Waiheke (without reticulation), we have a much closer connection with where our water comes from and where our wastewater goes. Knowing where and how our household waste and greenwaste ends up is very important too. I think Waiheke should have more control of it\'s own waste and retain green waste on the Island to encourage us all to use resources more wisely.
I think we need to take steps now to ensure that we are in a position to take over looking after our own waste once the current contract has expired. I am interested in how some communities are converting their waste into power and on a simpler issue, of course we should retain our green waste for island use. It would be awesome if in the near future we change our way of seeing something as waste to instead seeing it as a useful resource.
Charissa
Why throw your wealth away? I come from Yorkshire originally and there they say \"Where there\'s muck there\'s brass\" That is, our \'waste\' is a valuable resource not to be wasted.
Local employment was doing really well from our resource stream and it was taken from us in what I consider to be a mockery of democracy. I would like to see a council brave enough to break the TPI contract and return it to the Waiheke Waste Resource Trust in the name of local.
On the board I will lobby for thereturn of control of this resource to the community.
Dear Sue,
I believe that Waiheke should control her own waste. I am aware of the initiaves that have developed on Waiheke since the early 1980\'s that culminated in the development of Clean Stream.
I see no sense in trucking green waste off the island.
Thanks for the question.
Paul
Hi Sue,
I believe Waiheke\'s waste is an asset, especially its green waste. The green waste being shipped off island now is the equivalent of exporting our topsoil. We cannot do without it. Island soils are easily degraded and compost is essential for the long term health of the island ecosystem. I strongly support returning control of the island\'s waste to the community.
Waiheke already proved that it could profitably manage its own waste and was in the middle of great innovations when it was interrupted by corporate protectionism as the C&R dominated Committee pushed through the multinational waste contractor the city was using already. One could ask why, as any isthmus-based waste management solution is more costly, which was one of the reasons that Clean Stream won its bid initially.
Waiheke is the only place where TPI meets with the community to ensure that it is living up to its promises of meeting the performance the island was accustomed to under the community waste management programme.
Thank you for your question,
Millie Watkins
