City Gleanings: WDO Used Tire Program Plan
In a memo dated August 12, 2009 from Valerie Harvey, Acting Director Parks and Recreation, to the Mayor and Members of Council, Ms. Harvey states:
The WDO Used Tire Program Plan comes into effect on September 1, 2009. The full cost and physical responsibility of the program will belong to the tire industry and will be administered by the Ontario Tire Stewards (OTS).
Under the current system municipalities, tire retailers, etc. charge customers an environmental fee to collect their used tires. This fee is used to offset the cost that they must pay to a hauler to remove and ship the used tires to a processing facility for recycling or re-treading. However, this does not always happen and sometimes the tires are stock piled or dumped illegally.
Under the new program, the tire manufacturers will have to remit an annual payment to OTS based on their tire production into the Ontario market. These payments will in turn fund the Used Tire Program Plan.
Retailers/dealers of new tires, municipal landfill sites/transfer stations and automobile scrap yards will be able to register with OTS as Collectors. The Collectors will not be able to charge a fee to their customers to manage their used tires. Instead, the Collectors will be paid by OTS a collection allowance of $.88 per passenger/light truck tire and $3.05 per medium truck tire to handle and store the tires prior to removal from their site. Haulers who are registered with OTS will then pick up and haul the tires at no cost to the Collectors to the processing facilities. The haulers will not receive payment from OTS for their hauling services until the tires have been delivered to registered processing Facilities. The entire process is monitored by a manifesting system from the collection sites to the processing facilities and a comprehensive audit program.
