For over a decade, community clean ups of Illegal dumpsites on the lower Coast’s back roads and trails have been a regular occurrence. Sept. 16 will see the Sunshine Coast Regional District’s (SCRD) 10th Trash Bash, hosted in the Pender Harbour and Egmont areas, with the Pender Harbour Hikers (PHH) coordinating litter collection efforts along maintained roadways as well as addressing backcountry dumpsites.
Volunteers can sign up online or on event day at Lions Park in advance of the 10 a.m. campaign start time. PHH spokesperson Randy Picketts told Coast Reporter that those who report with off-road capable vehicles will be assigned dumpsites that have been identified for cleanup. The SCRD has stated that those ready for a less adventurous outing will be directed in roadside and ditch litter collection efforts in the area of Pender Harbour Secondary School and on sides of the highway adjacent to the park. The event is to wind up with a complementary lunch and prize draws at the park for those who have taken part.
Picketts credited the Pender Harbour and Area Residents Association, the area’s Rotary and Lions Clubs, as well as multiple local businesses with providing support to make the group’s community clean up events and other efforts possible.
Fun hikes that serve a purpose
PHH conducts frequent hikes in the area, which are free to participate in throughout the year. This month, outings are planned for Mondays and Wednesdays. Regular visitors to backcountry areas, PHH's members maintain the trails used during many of their outings and also watch for and report illegal dumpsites to the SCRD.
The hiker’s group, which formed in 2011, has been officially taking on cleanup activities since 2014. Picketts said the group’s first organized collection outing attracted about 50 individuals and sent just over five tonnes of waste and recyclables to SCRD solid waste sites. Subsequent events hosted have seen volunteers number between 20 and 30 and volumes collected in the two-to three-tonne range.
“We have noticed a decline in appliances due to the SCRD accepting them at no charge at the transfer station. Since our yearly event has taken place we are happy to realize a decline in all garbage,” Picketts wrote in a Sept. 7 email. In November 2022, through a partnership with the provincial Major Appliance Recycling Roundtable, the SCRD stopped charging fees for the redirection of residential appliances including stoves, washing machines and fridges with Freon at its Pender Harbour waste transfer station and Sechelt landfill.
But the hikers are still finding abandoned vehicles, tires, propane tanks and gyproc dumped in trail areas. Speaking with Coast Reporter on Sept. 11 Picketts commented that "unless you make disposal of everything at the landfill free, you are still going to get some people dumping illegally. I don’t understand the logic, given the time and wear and tear on a vehicle to take it up into the forest rather than to the landfill."
In his view, the lack of affordable housing on the Coast is compounding problems with back road trash. In 2020, the group removed an abandoned fifth wheel trailer from an area near BC Hydro's Malaspina substation. In addition to make-shift living units, Picketts said encampments often leave behind other refuse, noting that “If the homeless can’t afford a house, they can't afford to take anything to the landfill."
The regional program’s history
The SCRD reported that its Trash Bash events have happened each year since 2012, except for 2020 and 2021 due to COVID restrictions. The locations targeted are rotated throughout different electoral jurisdictions, with the two most recent events focused on areas from Halfmoon Bay to Roberts Creek, and Elphinstone to West Howe Sound. The last time one was hosted in Area A was in 2018.
According to its communications department, since 2015 the SCRD’s program has retrieved more than 30 tonnes of discarded material. The local government budgeted about $8,000 to cover program costs in 2023.
In addition, the regional district operates a Good Samaritan program that offsets its landfill processing fees for materials collected by volunteers from local illegal dumpsites.
