Those who hand in bulky waste at the recycling center in the district must pay for it.
The AfD in the district council has now applied to abolish the fees - at least up to an amount of 2.5 cubic meters.
The idea sounds good, but it also has a horse, because: The garbage fees would rise.
Dachau
- Most recently, at the end of the 1990s, an average of 9,000 tons of bulky waste a year were handed over to the region's recycling centers by the district residents.
Fees did not have to be paid for this, a system of fees based on solidarity applied: the disposal of bulky waste was allocated less to the garbage fees of all.
The district council therefore made a decision in 1998 and switched from the solidarized fee principle to the polluter pays principle: Anyone who has to dispose of bulky waste should pay for it in future.
The amount of the fee depends on the amount delivered;
currently it is 2.50 euros per quarter cubic meter of bulky waste.
The consequences of this decision, remembers Peter Kistler, responsible department head at the municipal waste management of the district, “were felt immediately.
There was a huge kink.
Since then we have only had an average of around 4,000 tons of bulky waste per year ”.
The fear of many politicians at the time that citizens would henceforth only dispose of their garbage in nature instead of at the recycling center also proved to be largely unfounded: According to Kistler, the costs of disposing of the “wild” garbage do not exceed 4,000 euros a year.
In view of an upcoming recalculation of the garbage fees, which is due for the year 2022, the AfD district parliamentary group now had an idea: In an application to District Administrator Stefan Löwl, they suggested “relieving the citizens financially” by reducing the “bulky waste tax in household quantities “Either completely free of charge or free of charge up to a delivery quantity of 2.5 cubic meters per week.
The Free Voters Dachau also advocate the abolition of bulky waste fees: In addition to relieving the financial burden on citizens, according to District Councilor Sebastian Leiß, they are primarily concerned with avoiding "garbage tourism" in the surrounding districts, stopping illegal waste disposal in nature and reducing administrative costs, which is "not insignificant" due to the charging of the fees.
General garbage fees would rise
Kistler, however, points out that the collection of the bulky waste fees means absolutely no effort: "That just runs in the accounting." What should cause the accountants a lot more headaches, however, would be a loss of the revenue from the bulky waste levy: In 2019 were According to Kistler, 700,000 euros that were earned at the recycling yards.
Since the waste management, according to the municipal tax law (KAG), has to work self-financing, it should not simply pass on the deficit resulting from the elimination of the fees to the district.
“We are a separate department, we have our own household, and we don't get any money from the district council.
We have to finance ourselves through fees, ”summarizes Kistler.
For the Dachau district citizen, this means that if the bulky waste fees were to be completely eliminated, the waste fees would have to rise by around eight percent, Kistler calculates.
In addition, one would have to ask: “What do we do with wood, glass and building rubble?” For that you also have to pay fees at the 21 recycling yards in the district.
Kistler says that he can most likely imagine “free amounts” of bulky waste.
At the same time, however, urgently warns against referring to other districts for comparison when discussing bulky waste charges.
Because: “That is not serious!” Basically, the garbage fees represent “the efficiency of a waste management system”.
In the district of Dachau, for example, citizens would not pay anything for their bins, but elsewhere bins would have to be bought.
The number of recycling centers, their opening times or the number of administrative employees would ultimately have an impact on the amount of garbage fees.
Therefore, says Kistler, who describes himself as the “average garbage citizen”, the previous fee model based on the polluter pays principle is in the end “fairer”.
Because I would rather pay for myself what garbage I have than burden others with it ”.
According to District Administrator Löwl, one can at least “discuss” the topic.
At the unanimous request of the district committee, Peter Kistler and his colleagues will therefore now explain to politicians: What types are there and what do they cost?
At the end of the day, says Kistler, “politics must then decide”.