Garby leaves residents with trashy dilemma

One of the hot local topics lately seems to be this strange light gray container that has been appearing on most of our front lawns. Why do we have this Garby? Why is it so much smaller than our old garbage cans? What do we do if we have more trash than Garby fits? And, most importantly, did we really need it?

I certainly see the appeal from the city's side of things. Less space means more bags, more bags means more tags, and tags are revenue for the city. Garby also helps keep costs down by being willing to be machine loaded into the garbage trucks, saving time and effort, something that we could not do with our old garbage cans.

On the other hand, it makes it much harder for us to get all of our trash disposed of. Squeezing all of our trash into Garby is, at best, an iffy proposition. If it should not all fit, our only option becomes leaving the extra bags on the curb for the raccoons to feast on.

It would be nice if it were at least possible to purchase more Garbys for the extra trash, even if tagging it was still required.

While I can see the benefits of Garbys, I wish the rules on what to do with one's extra trash would allow for use of cans, or that Garby had gained a few more inches before being delivered.

Gabe Leonard

Cedar Rapids