The public is being invited to have its say on the draft Waste Minimisation and Management Plan (WMMP) for the Waitaki District.
The WMMP is the guiding document for how the district manages its waste and recycling activity, and is reviewed every six years to reflect changes in environmental standards, regulation and the needs of the district.
The public consultation for the plan began this week.
Waitaki District Council’s Waste Minimisation Officer Lucianne White said dealing with trash and making sure as little as possible was created, was something everyone needed to get behind.
"It’s time to make sure that we don’t leave a mess for future generations to clean up."
Waitaki District Mayor Gary Kircher said the town’s rubbish used to be dumped right next to the coast.
"The sea is eating into the old Hampden Landfill and two places on Beach Road, where there is danger of the dumped rubbish getting washed into the ocean," he said.
The town was still paying the price, with millions of rate payers’ dollars needed to repair the situation.
"We’ve got to look to the future and do what we can to minimise and manage our waste responsibly."
The 2023 national waste strategy, Terautaki para, is a vision for a low-emissions and low-waste New Zealand,that proposes changes to how councils collect waste to achieve this.
While the new government has yet to review Te rautaki para, and agree to continue with its proposals, the council is using the strategy as inspiration to plan for better waste solutions.
Mr Kircher said he had not seen a time frame for the new government to review Te rautaki para, but it was "very worthwhile research that helps inform decision-making into the future".
He said if the government did not agree to the proposals, at worst "we will have information and views that are not utilised".
"At best, we will have great information which will help Waitaki make its own decisions on how it minimises and manages waste, recycling and greenwaste".
The draft WMMP focuses on four areas to meet future demands, waste solutions and collection, leadership and collaboration in communities, engagement and education and potential infrastructure.
Mrs White said part of the new waste strategy around infrastructure and collections, focused on a "strong circular economy".
To keep more resources in circulation it meant the council required the facilities and capacity to do this, she said.
"The plan proposes to do the work to understand what infrastructure our community needs, or needs to be able to access out-of-district, once we know what will be compulsory for councils to do," she said.
The plan also proposed to strengthen existing initiatives, with on going support for the Waitaki Resource Recovery Trust.
"[We will continue] supporting them in site development, signage and branding to ensure our community has reuse, repurpose and repair opportunities to divert items that still have life in them from landfill," Mrs White said.
The draft WMMP 2024-2030 plan and consultation documents are on the council website.
Mrs White said the council was looking forward to the public letting them know what they think.
