Despite a plea from some local charities the City of Windsor is not implementing a bylaw to regulate clothing donation bins in the city.
Not-for profits like Goodwill Industries and St. Vincent de Paul were interested in having a bylaw formed that would prevent bins from being placed without a property owner's consent.
Goodwill Industries CEO Kevin Smith says unauthorized donation bins from for-profit groups have popped up in many southwestern Ontario municipalities.
"These bins, if they drop them off and there's no recourse, I can tell you, why wouldn't they drop them off? There would be no reason not to. I think they don't understand how serious it can be for a business owner [to get rid of the unauthorized bins]," says Smith.
He fears these for-profit bins will take donations away from his organization and others in the community.
The majority of councillors were against implementing a bylaw because there have been few complaints about bins in the city to date. Many also believe any bylaw would be difficult to enforce and would take a lot of resources to implement.
"Five complaints in 10 years does not warrant a serious situation, one of those complaints being an unregulated bin the other four being for another matter," says Councillor Fred Francis.
Smith says from his experience with bylaws in Chatham-Kent and Sarnia the bylaw would not be a drain on city resources.
