BC Government Thwarts Effort To Upgrade Sewage Facilities

Christianne Wilhelmson of Georgia Strait Alliance - photo by Laurie MacBride

Documents recently obtained through a Freedom of Information (FOI) request by the Georgia Strait Alliance show that the current BC Government was pressured by the Capital Regional District (CRD) to approve Victoria's lackluster 25 year Core Area Liquid Waste Management Plan (LWMP) in 2003 and that the province knowingly ignored a 1993 agreement with Washington State to upgrade sewage treatment standards for Victoria.

The documents show that CRD staff pressured the province repeatedly into approving the LWMP despite the fact that the plan did not contain any provisions, plans or schedules for improving sewage treatment works. Past provincial governments all repeatedly and persistently demanded that the CRD upgrade its two main sewage plants at Clover and Macaulay Point. The documents also show that Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO) wanted nothing to do with the LWMP if treatment was not in the plan. DFO's then Regional Director General John Davis wouldn't even commit DFO to further studies if treatment was not on the table.

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