It now costs $22 to dump a big bag of lawn clippings in Marlborough after new charges were brought in this month.
Straight Lines owner Neil Holdaway says he will lose customers if he puts his mowing prices up. Photo: Chloe Ranford/LDR
The charges come as Marlborough District Council looks to separate the drop-off points for rubbish and green waste in a bid to cut weekend wait times.
The move means those with cut grass and trimmed bushes no longer get weighed at the council's multimillion-dollar Waste Sorting Centre, with entry and exit weigh bridges.
But it also means the cost of dumping a wool sack of lawn clippings has jumped from about $4 to $22.20.
Lawn mower-by-trade Neil Holdaway, owner of Straight Lines, said the change had spurred him onto using a private waste collector.
I worked out a couple of days ago, after another overcharging, that this was going to sink my business ... I have a lawn I do for $40 by filling up several wool bags halfway. But I'm now charged $11.10 per half bag, so if I fill up more than three from the job then I don't make any money."
Upping his prices would lose him most of his clients, and prevent him from picking up more, he said.
The alternative was to shut his business, dump the grass (which was "a no-go"), or take the grass to another company.
Council solid waste manager Alec McNeil said the previous system charged based on weight, but caused queues of up to 45 minutes on weekends.
So the council opted to return to measuring and charging by volume, he said.
"The weighbridge couldn't be argued with as it was a machine ... The attendants working out volumes are going to estimate.
"If you've turned up with a trailer of grass that looks full, but could have been squashed in a bit more, the attendant is not going to work out the exact density before giving you your bill."
McNeil said, in an ideal world, the council would have weighbridges for both rubbish and green waste.
He would put this and other alternatives to the council in January.
While lawn clippings could be put into council bin bags, this was warned against on the packet.
Grass left in bin bags could "cook" and melt the lining.
Lawn clippings had been a headache for the Marlborough District Council for years, which said it could not compost due to herbicides, through people spraying their lawns with the likes of Weed and Feed.
So the grass was sent to landfill, at a cost to the council of $231 a tonne. About 79 tonnes of grass was sent to Bluegums Landfill last year.
But in other regions, councils were happy to compost grass as green waste.
Christchurch City Council resource recovery manager Ross Trotter said the council owned an organics processing plant, where they could send most grass.
It costs $22.20 to dump a wool sack, pictured, of grass in Marlborough. Photo: Supplied
Herbicides, except clopyralid, were managed during composting.
A Nelson City Council spokeswoman said households wanting to compost were given $15 by the council to help them get started.
While Colleen Wastney, co-owner of private composters Greenwaste to Zero, said clippings could be taken to their Richmond centre for $18 a cubic metre. In Marlborough, the council was charging $46.20 per cubic metre.
Wastney said their grass was mixed with the company's green waste compost to create 'lawnpost', which encouraged lawns to grow.
The high temperatures the composts were exposed to destroyed any"toxins and nasties", like herbicides, she said.
People in Marlborough were divided on the new charges on Friday, as the cost of dumping branches and other green waste hadn't changed much. It was once again just the lawn clippings causing a problem.
One man had paid the $11.10 to dump half a wool sack of grass and yelled out his car window,"It's a rip off. The weighbridge worked just fine".
Local Democracy Reporting is a public interest news service supported by RNZ, the News Publishers' Association and NZ On Air.
