Editor:
It was interesting to note recently that Mayor Henderson has taken a new interest in his signature action as mayor, the building of Sechelt’s new sewage plant.
To hear him tell it, the conception and build was a near flawless collaboration of all interests arriving at a shiny example of a completed public works project. In my opinion, the record informs differently. The most important interest, the public, were completely left out of any input on the location and technology used, the first that the public heard was that a decision had been made and a contract signed. In the fullness of time, we now know that the new technology cost significantly more than the conventional technology planned for with one of the stated goals to produce potable water, never achieved, to my understanding.
In times of heavy rainfall, unfiltered sewage spews into our Salish Sea, the much vaunted greenhouse grows plants that are exposed to pharmaceuticals and hormones, to my understanding. Over budget with operating costs up significantly, the public was told that the new plant could become a tourist attraction.
Long suffering nearby home owners who had been promised for years that the old downtown plant would be closed and relocated were out of luck, property values would remain affected. The new plant required that the public works yard had to be moved, becoming a long drawn out process with additional inflated costs.
Subsequently it has been discovered that the new plant will have to be enlarged on its small downtown lot. Built adjacent to an important wildlife wetland this location I believe is susceptible in time to rising sea levels and the dangers of a tsunami. Years later we see that the advantages of the Dusty Road location as budgeted and planned for were a missed opportunity.
Neil Edmunds, Sechelt
