The search has begun for families to participate in “Mission: Impossible?” that centres upon household waste management.

Proposed by Mayor Jeff Genung during the Oct. 21 council meeting, the mission is an effort to understand concerns some residents have expressed, some using inflammatory comments, over the proposal to reduce waste collection to every other week.

Residents who don’t believe it’s possible to live with the change are invited to apply and five will be selected to participate. Those becoming “Mission: Impossible? Families” will have their waste collected, sorted and shown the results.

Mayor Genung says this shouldn’t be perceived to be anything more than a fact-finding mission to determine how or if the town should proceed with a revised waste management bylaw.

“I want to be clear that I’m looking at everything,” says Genung. “This is not a way to force this through or find another reason to do it. It’s really an education for me and for council and hopefully a few families along the way.”

He’s hoping a large number of people will apply to participate and would like to see a variety of family sizes form the focus group.

Once selected, their trash will be picked up on an undisclosed date so not to tarnish the results, then brought to the eco-centre, labelled and set aside.

“At the end of the week, I’m going to go with waste management staff and we’re going to film and record everything we do and see what the outcomes are.”

Results will be provided to the participating families and to the public.

Whether participants want their names in the public domain will be their choice.

“Once they’ve signed up and agreed to go through the process, they can choose to be in the public face or anonymous. So, it’s not about making anybody wrong or shaming them into changing their behaviour or anything, we really want to get a good idea of what people are throwing in what bin.”

Genung brought the idea forward to council after receiving some angry feedback. Some called him out and threatened to dump garbage on his lawn or bring it to the RancheHouse.

The revised waste management bylaw received second reading by council in October, but it also called for the creation of the focus group to look at the issue. Council also asked administration to examine ways to reduce the financial burden for those requiring a second bin. Currently, it is proposed they pay $45 upfront and an additional $13 per month.

For those with special circumstances or greater needs, the bylaw included exemptions and options for additional black bins.

For example, residents with two or more children under four in diapers could apply for excess waste bags or for an extra 120l black cart for six months. Those with medical or health situations could do the same.

Data collected by Waste and Recycling indicates an extra bin would not be necessary in most cases. In random samplings of black bins, they discovered 51 per cent of items placed in the black bins actually belonged in blue recycling bin or green organics bin. If properly sorted, they estimate on average the black bin would only be 27 per cent full, instead of the current average of 56 per cent.

The waste management bylaw is scheduled to come back to council in the New Year and no later than February.

Those who want to participate in Mission: Impossible? have until Fri. Nov. 23 to apply to the town.