The death of four bears in 10 days in Coquitlam has Mayor Richard Stewart contemplating a minimum 10-fold increase in fines for residents found to be irresponsible with their garbage.

Stewart was responding to the fact that the four bears killed by Conservation Service officials were all found seeking out easily accessible garbage in residential areas.

"If they're in your garbage when the bear is shot, I'm proposing a $5,000 to $10,000 fine," Stewart said Thursday.

The city's bylaws currently allow for a $500 fine to be issued, though no residents have been fined yet this year, according to Steffanie Warriner, the city's manager of environmental services.

"No fines have been issued yet, but we do have that tool to use if we need to," she said.

Stewart said the city prefers education over enforcement, and the city will likely engage in another round of public education before issuing fines.

"The bear gets shot, the resident gets a warning not to do it again," he said. "There's an imbalance there. The consequences don't seem to match."

Coquitlam Bear Aware co-ordinator Drake Stephens said three of the four bears killed were removed from the upper Coast Meridian Road area, while the fourth was located near Gilley's Trail.

On top of the bears killed, the provincial hotline tracking bear sightings has responded to 64 local calls in the last 10 days. Though Stephens said one bear sighting can elicit up to six or eight calls, the centre was typically fielding about 10 calls per week in June.

"If you don't reward them, they don't come -- garbage is the No. 1 problem," he said.

Stephens said the city is seeing poor compliance rates with its solid waste management bylaw in the Chineside and Ranch Park neighbourhoods in particular.

The bylaws stipulate that garbage, recycling and yard trimmings can only be placed curbside between the hours of 5:30 a.m. and 7:30 p.m. on collection days in the city's "Identified Bear Activity Area," which encompasses almost all of the city with the exception of areas around Austin Avenue.

"Five bears have been removed from that area since September, yet you get a lot of residents saying, 'Why should I comply, there's not bears up here?' Well, there's bears up there," Stephens said.

He added that compliance with the city's waste management bylaw has been "very good" on the Westwood Plateau and "excellent" near Burke Mountain, though new problems are inadvertently being introduced.

"All of the construction going on [on Burke Mountain] is putting a new twist on things. Construction workers are leaving lunch scraps around, and that's drawing bears into construction sites and that's causing problems," he said.

"I would say most of the guys have been pretty good, but they've got new sub trades coming in and out daily and it's not on their radar."

The city is reminding residents to call the Report All Poachers and Polluters hotline in the event that a bear is spotted. The phone number is 1-877-952-7277.