P&M recycling has until April to shut down warehouse

A Whitehorse recycler has been granted some breathing room in a dispute over the operations at one of its buildings.

Whitehorse city council voted last night to give P&M Recycling until Apr. 7 to heed a city order to cease operations at its warehouse on Sixth Avenue.

P&M owner Pat McInroy said last week that his recycling service would stop if the city rejected a rezoning application that would allow the warehouse to remain in operation.

McInroy applied to the city for a zoning change to allow industrial use at the company's warehouse, but that would have required amending the Official Community Plan. The city decided against that.

The company's bottle depot is properly zoned for its activities, but the adjacent warehouse that's being used to process non-refundable items is not.

The city says its fire prevention officer has expressed safety concerns with the site and it has received "numerous" complaints from neighbouring residents.

Councillor Dan Boyd said it's important for the city to complete the curbside recycling process before making P&M shut down part of its operations.

"The timing on this is just, it's really unfortunate," he said. "Because I'd like to see that process come to a natural conclusion and see what the outcomes of that are. And that may very well inform what opportunities there are for P&M Recycling."

Correction : This story originally said the city had yet to make a decision on Pat McInroy's application for a zoning change, when in fact the city had already rejected it.(Jan 26, 2016 6:41 PM)