Shopping carts and other debris at the Prince Albert landfill. (Nigel Maxwell/paNOW Staff)

By Susan McNeil

Stray shopping carts end up in local landfill

Sep 27, 2022 | 9:07 AM

Following a recent social media post by a local grocery store wondering where their carts had gone, city council learned yesterday that found carts often end up in the metal recycling at the landfill.

Council talked about how to connect businesses with missing carts with Coun. Blake Edwards saying that the carts are stolen property and quite probably a lot of the contents inside them as well.

“It seems like a quarter of the city is walking around with shopping carts. The fact is the shopping carts are stolen. That’s another part of this reality. They’re stolen from businesses,” he said.

For that reason, he wants to seek comment from the police commission.

“Usually if you’re walking down the street with a stolen TV, you’re stopped,” said Edwards, adding that the value of a cart is likely between $200 and $500.

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City manager Sherry Person said she talked to the sanitation department about what happens when carts are seen around town.

“Currently, the city staff will pick up shopping carts if they see them. They were being taken to the city yards for pickup,” she said. “They end up at the landfill, if nobody picks them up, they end up at the landfill.”

Person said the request was to have businesses reminded to come get the carts if they wanted, but they don’t always want to. Uncollected carts will go through the metal recycling process.

Coun. Ted Zurakowski pointed out businesses don’t all choose to lock up their carts.

“I’ve called grocery stores and said there’s a cart over here would you come get it? ‘No, we don’t do that.’ OK, well would you lock them up? ‘No, we don’t do that either,’” he said.

The city does have an old policy in place regarding shopping carts and an estimated $5 is charged to a business collecting their stray carts. Councillors said that the value needed to be higher and closer to $10.

Council decided to have staff set up a process and let businesses know that the carts are there once per month before they are disposed.

Administration will also report back to council more detail of what is done now when carts are found.

That report will then be sent to the police commission.

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susan.mcneil@pattisonmedia.com