The odd thing is the sense of grievance City Hall seems to carry against the ’scavengers’. City residents pay for garbage removal so the city gets paid whether it is taken away or not - so why aren’t we encouraging this kind of work ethic? Of course, if I see anyone get ticketed for going through my bin I will not hesitate to tell suggest I leave the bottles for the bottle collection people and it is the city who are the real scavengers.

Doesn’t the business model of the recycle program rely on the income from money back bottles and cans in order to supplement the cost of the program? I suppose that you could raise property taxes a little more from those arrogant hard working citizens to cover the costs of the lost revenue, in effect, raising taxes to supplement the income of a few desperate homeless “scavengers”.

And jonZor, you must have very respectful and honest homeless people where you live, inviting them onto your porch to take things. Personally, I prefer to help out the unfortunate and down and out by making financial contributions to shelters and food banks instead of putting MY money towards booze, dope and ciggs for the “scavengers”. I also like to save my bottles for the local kid’s sports teams and the boy scouts that come around every so often.

Stageleft, I think you may be onto something with your two points. A. For sure this is just a ruse to take away from the conservative’s plot to blow up buildings and such to keep everybody living in fear.
B. I’m pretty sure that the Cons just really enjoy kicking people when they are down. Like, I mean, doesn’t everybody? You are for sure onto something big there. Maybe you should follow these conspiracy theories up with some more good posts.

Toronto recently (Feb. ‘08) eliminated 300 shelter beds downtown and almost no affordable housing is being built.

Toronto just bought landfill site in my neck of the woods. Purchase price $265 million. That’s what the aluminum is needed for.

Most cities are able to make money on garbage and recycling because of the price for newsprint and aluminum now.

Garbage ladies are a huge problem here in Vancouver. The thing is that it provides a kind of horrible subsistence living that should be discouraged. We need to find better financial solutions for these trash-pickers. I hate it when I see so many people rifling through the trash of the city. It makes our society look run-down and dilapidated, which is strange when you consider how filthy rich people here are. The contrast between the dumpster divers and the luxury car crowd is beginning to look like Sao Paolo.