Councillor steps up rubbish campaign

MOORABOOL Shire councillor Steve Venditti-Taylor’s war on waste – both legal and illegal – continues, as he pushes for at least a permanent hard rubbish collection in the municipality.

Cr Venditti-Taylor was one of two councillors (the other Cr Sheila Freeman) who submitted notices of motion earlier this year seeking an investigation of kerbside hard rubbish collections and subsidising other waste services.

Their motions followed a trial of subsidised services for one, three-cubic-metre transfer station pass, a free green waste month and a half-price mattress disposal month.

“All these services plus other options will be explored and costed to inform a report to Council anticipated by the end of the year,” Shire CEO Derek Madden said.

“The report will also consider the draft waste service standards the Victorian Government is mandating across Victoria.”

“The residents in Bacchus Marsh are really crying out for a hard rubbish pick-up,” Cr Venditti-Taylor said.

He said a lot of elderly people or those with disabilities often could not make it to a tip even if they had a voucher.

“At the end of the day they have to pay someone to get rid of the rubbish, so people want the kerbside pickups – that’s the feedback I’ve got,” he said.

“Any services that we offer are going to be subsidised anyway, so if the general public wants them, that’s what we’re there for.

“We can’t have nothing; at the moment we’re running the illegal dumping campaign…which is doing a fantastic job.”

Cr Venditti-Taylor pointed to a post on the Shire’s Facebook page earlier this week, which called on builders to secure their materials on-site so that rubbish from construction projects does not escape.

He is a strong voice on illegal dumping and makes regular posts on his personal Facebook page, describing the problem as “a massive priority” as a new councillor.

The Shire was recently in a dispute with the Environment Protection Authority (EPA) over more than 1200 empty acetylene cylinders left on two truck trailers on public land at Merrimu, just east of Bacchus Marsh.

It objected to having to pay $500,000 to have the cylinders removed after an EPA clean-up order, and as recently as last week called on the authority to act on what it claims is industrial waste that remains inside the property boundary.

But the Shire believes its calls are being ignored.