Chalmers community board chairwoman Jan Tucker says she will continue to press for a green waste station to replace the Sawyers Bay landfill, which is to close in just over two months.
The landfill is scheduled to close by June 30, 2009, when existing Otago Regional Council resource consents expire.
The site will be decommissioned and restored over the following six months.
In its place, the Dunedin City Council has arranged for three community clean-up days to be held each year, in September, February and August, initially at the landfill site.
Skips will be available on those days to accept certain kinds of waste.
The clean-up days will continue, at an estimated cost of $6000 each year, until any option arising from the council review of kerbside collection, which will be completed in 2010, is implemented.
However, Mrs Tucker told the Otago Daily Times she did not know if the clean-up days would be adequate for those using the landfill, who typically lived in Port Chalmers and Sawyers Bay.
She accepted the legal requirement to end the landfill's operation, but said its imminent closure was what most people who stopped her in the street in Port Chalmers wanted to discuss.
"It's really hard when you have had a facility that you are losing. It's really hard for people to adjust to that," she said.
However, while illegal dumping was already happening in some parts of Port Chalmers, Mrs Tucker said she was not convinced the landfill's closure would add to the problem.
There had been no noticeable increase in dumping in other communities relying on clean-up days, such as Aramoana or Long Beach, she said.
Despite that, Mrs Tucker said she would continue to argue for a green waste station at the council's upcoming annual plan hearings, and the community board was also considering running its own green waste clean-up days.
The nearest alternative facility was the privately-run transfer station on Wickliffe St, near the city centre, 10km from the landfill.
Council solid waste manager Ian Featherston said decommissioning the landfill and restoring the site would cost about $170,000, including a clay cap, topsoil and a new grass layer for future grazing of the land.
