Ratepayers within Melbourne’s Kingston City Council will reportedly be out millions of dollars to clean up former landfill sites over the coming years.
News Corp reported the council is urging the Victorian Government to assist with the money collected from landfill levies.
The council has already set aside $5 million for remedial work over the next four years.
Council city assets and environment general manager Daniel Freer told News Corp the council spends around $250,000 a year to monitor the former landfill sites which it is responsible for.
“Council would welcome assistance from the Victorian Government to fast-track rehabilitation and to acquire private land in order to transform former landfill sites into public parkland,” Mr Freer said.
Landfill levies help to fund Sustainability Victoria and the Environment Protection Authority (EPA), as well as metropolitan and regional waste management groups. The remainder is paid into the Sustainability Fund, established in 2010 for the State to reinvest in waste management and green house reduction projects.
Responsibility for the clean-up of landfills rests with the land owners which in Kingston is a combination of council and private owners.
Council has allocated $2 million of the current budget to the Eder St South landfill site with plans to transform it into a public park.
The two remaining operating privately owned landfills in the area are set to close by the end of the year and the cost of their rehabilitation will rest with landowners Cleanaway.
Cleanaway’s post collections regional manager Mark Globan told News Corp they anticipated Fraser Rd and Victory Rd tips would stop receiving rubbish in mid to late 2017.
He said rehabilitation of the Fraser Rd site was scheduled to begin in 2020.
A planning amendment for the Victory Rd site was recently approved by Kingston Council, to allow Cleanaway to transform the site into a community park.
Six privately owned former landfills and four council managed ones have been issued a clean up notice by the EPA that requires owners to submit a rehabilitation plan.