Nobody at the Capital Regional District should be surprised that Esquimalt council unanimously rejected the sewage rezoning.
Esquimalt has faced months of a high-pressure PR campaign and the constant threat of “if you don’t give us what we want, we will get the province to overrule you.” Add to that the threat of taking away any compensations for hosting the entire region’s poo plant. By trying to bully the municipality with the least power on the CRD board, they managed to alienate an entire community and waste a lot of time and money.
The fact remains that we are required to treat our sewage, and it has to go somewhere. The CRD has long stated that nobody wants a large secondary sewage treatment plant in their neighbourhood, and they are right.
The solution is simple and won’t take much more time: if nobody will host this type of plant, then we need to build the kind of plant that people do want in their neighbourhood. That plan of distributed tertiary treatment (bigger versions of Dockside Green) has never been given an independent examination by the CRD. It is time to stop fighting the public and start making a difference — together.
Meagan Klaassen
Esquimalt
