Council explores liquid waste options

City of Powell River councillors have picked up the strands of developing a liquid waste management plan (LWMP) with a motion about next steps.

The LWMP steering committee, which is made up of city elected officials, with the exception of Mayor Dave Formosa, and representatives from Powell River Regional District and Tla’amin (Sliammon) First Nation, met on September 18 to discuss what should happen next.

In 2011, city council passed a resolution to enter into a phased-in co-treatment-consolidated LWMP, subject to the city being successful in its $7.2-million grant application to the BC Innovations Fund. At the end of the year, the city found out the grant application was unsuccessful.

Co-treatment is a proposal to treat city sewage at Catalyst Paper Corporation’s Powell River division. In January, Catalyst entered into creditor protection under the Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act, which put the brakes on any further discussion about co-treatment. However, Catalyst emerged from creditor protection in September.

Councillor Jim Palm, who chairs the LWMP steering committee, said the group was faced with the decision of whether to continue on the path it had chosen last year or strike out in a new direction. “Do we stay the course and hopefully get to a point where we’re able to submit something to the ministry for consideration, or do we go all the way back to square one?” he asked.

Palm reported on a verbal conversation with provincial officials about the city’s grant application, which he said had some deficiencies, including being comprehensive in terms of public consultation. “There were a number of issues with it and what they did suggest is that we submit it in the second round, clear up the deficiencies in the application. But that deadline has since passed because we were caught up in the Catalyst situation.”

Later in the meeting, Palm clarified his comment and explained the problem wasn’t that there hadn’t been enough consultation, it was the fact that council had not held a public meeting, as outlined in its public consultation plan, before it made a final recommendation. “That’s where the public consultation had not been carried out to the end yet,” he said.

Towards the end of the meeting, Councillor Russell Brewer made a motion to recommend to council that the city pursue a publicly owned and operated consolidated facility or facilities. Councillor Myrna Leishman seconded the motion, but when the vote was taken, it was defeated, with councillors Debbie Dee, Maggie Hathaway, Chris McNaughton and Stan Gisborne, the regional district’s representative on the committee, voting in opposition to it.

The committee did pass a motion to recommend to council that the city proceed with the following next steps: discuss options at the UBCM (Union of BC Municipalities) convention; confirm Tla’amin and Catalyst’s position in terms of the co-treatment option; and investigate grant opportunities. That motion was referred to the September 20 council meeting, where it passed.

Palm said at the council meeting that after 12 to 13 years, the city would like to move forward to completion “so that we can turn something in to the ministry of environment so that we can have a plan sitting on a shelf so that one day when the funding opportunity does become available, we can move swiftly to deal with our liquid waste.”