Litterbugs costing Toronto $25M, but no tickets handed out

All that melting snow in the city is revealing unsightly garbage in Toronto and there’s also an ugly financial cost to all that dirt.

“If nobody littered in the city, that’s potentially $25 million in savings,” Robert Orpin, the director of collection operations with the city of Toronto, told CityNews.

The city’s annual litter audit found cigarette butts were second only to gum as the most littered item last year.

But the city isn’t cashing in on those litterbugs.

Zero tickets were handed out in 2014 for breaking the city’s anti-littering bylaws.

A spokesperson for the city said offenders must be caught in the act to be ticketed, which makes it difficult to enforce.

Some residents argue the public garbage bins are poorly-designed, often broken and overflowing with refuse.

Orpin said the contractor in charge of the bins has a regular maintenance schedule.

“At least once a week they’re supposed to be there. I checked. We are servicing them at least once a week,” Orpin said.

Mayor John Tory concedes the city is partly to blame for all the trash piling up in the streets.

“We should be collecting things more often and I’ll try to see to that,” Tory said on Breakfast Television on Tuesday.