Quick Peaks: October 30, 2013

Report calls for lower ferry fares

BC Ferries is in an “affordability death spiral,” in which rising fares drive down ridership and revenue, according to a recently released report by the Ferry Advisory Committee Chairs (FACC).

FACC presented the report, called Coastal Ferries: An Unnecessary Crisis, as part of the provincial government’s budget-consultation process.

“The provincial rescue plan is to cut costs and service and ignore fare increases,” the report stated. “This plan missed the mark in several ways.”

The report proposes three options as pilot projects that could be applied to the whole system or a select number of routes: freezing fares on the minor, northern and Sunshine Coast routes at 2014 levels for 2015 and 2016; rolling back fares by 25 per cent in 2015, then increasing them two per cent; and cutting fares by 13.4 per cent in each of 2015 and 2016.

Click here to view full report.

Trash talk continues

At the October 24 board meeting, Powell River Regional District directors authorized the engagement of Tai Uhlmann, Abby McLennan and Inger-Lise Burns of the Let’s Talk Trash Team to continue fulfilling the roles, responsibilities and objectives of the Waste Management Education Program and at least bridge the program until the end of the year.

Coco Hess, of BHC Consulting, gave notice that she was no longer available to fulfill the contract for the project. Uhlmann, McLennan and Burns were all part of the team, along with Hess.