The Sunshine Coast Regional District (SCRD) will apply to the province this month for the Chapman and Edwards Lake siphons to stay in place for emergency use through to 2025.
At a Feb. 9 committee meeting SCRD board members debated if that application should be for that term or a longer one.
The importance of securing permission past Oct. 31, 2023, the existing deadline for siphon removal, came forward in a staff report on the meeting agenda. “It is possible, depending on weather patterns and drought conditions, that the SCRD will still require the siphon systems as an emergency water source in 2023,” the report states.
In the view of Sechelt director John Henderson, the siphons need to be a permanent component of the Chapman water system. “We know we are going to need them,” he said and called for the request to the province be to “leave them in until further notice." That did not receive committee support.
Letters and lobbying
While multiple directors voiced the need to seek a longer tenure for the siphons, chief administrative officer Dean McKinley advised the committee that discussion of support for them “as a permanent emergency measure” was within the scope of the Coast’s local government water summit sessions. With the next summit set for March 13, he recommended waiting for that date. He said the siphons would be “one of many tools we would be discussing to deal with short-term and long-term water needs." His view was that “there could be some direction on how to move forward together fairly quickly.”
A recommendation to have staff draft two letters on behalf of the board was made. One is to be directed to shíshálh Nation, seeking a letter of support for the SCRD’s park use permit and use approval applications to keep the siphons available for the coming two years. The other would go to the province, asking that approvals to extend the use of the siphons on an emergency basis for 2023 and 2024 be expedited.
Area E director Donna McMahon called for a follow-up plan on the correspondence with the provincial government. “I would really hate to be sitting here in August biting my nails until we hear if we are going to get an extension,” she said. Her suggestion was, “if we don’t hear back in one month we will phone, if we don’t hear back in two months, we will knock on doors." Chairperson Leonard Lee agreed to undertake that kind of “proactive approach” with the province.
Updating the community
To get a better sense of what could happen with Chapman water availability this summer, the committee recommended staff produce a model of system water demand taking into account a variety of “drought scenarios.”
That will be in addition to the resumption of regular “water update” reports that staff provided to the board in 2022. Area B director Justine Gabias said both would help with communication with the public, helping them to prepare as early as possible for what could be coming in a few months.
The committee also recommended staff provide an update on progress on the future of the siphons system to the board in the second quarter of 2023.
Those committee recommendations on the letters and the reports are slated for board consideration at its next regular meeting on Feb. 23.
Background on the siphons
In the report and at the meeting, staff explained the web of approvals and expiry dates related to the siphons and the water supplies they access. The siphons, installed at Chapmen Lake in 2017 and at Edwards Lake in 2022 exist within Tetrahedron Provincial Park under a temporary park use permit amendment. The current amendment expires on Oct. 31.
That amendment is part of a larger 10-year use permit the SCRD holds for a helicopter pad and water system infrastructure at the lakes, which expires Jan. 31, 2024. In 2019, the province turned down an SCRD application to amend the park boundaries and allow permanent water system infrastructure to be installed at the lakes.
While the SCRD’s 2022 amendment extension application for the siphons was for the maximum allowed two-year timeframe, only a single-year continuation was granted. The province took a month to respond to the SCRD's application and when it did, it recommended that the SCRD seek and bring other sources online to provide water supply should drought conditions be experienced into the fall of 2023.
Approval use extensions to the SCRD’s water licenses at the lakes are also required for the additional lake water drawn by the siphons. For Chapman, that approval is in place up to Aug. 23 of this year. At Edwards, the extension remains valid until Oct. 5, 2024.
The siphons can be tested during Stage 3 water restrictions but can only be operated after Stage 4 restrictions are activated for the Chapman system. Plans and timelines must be sent to the province for approval prior to starting and stopping their use. Environmental flow needs for Chapman Creek of 200 litres per second must be maintained and the shíshálh Nation must be notified prior to siphon operation.
