Like a recurring nightmare, Pan Pacific Aggregates (PPA) has raised its head once again in our community.
Company officials hosted a public information meeting on Thursday night, Sept. 17 in front of a less than receptive audience at the Senior's Centre in Sechelt.
PPA has applied to the Ministry of Energy, Mines and Petroleum Resources (MEMPR) to mine limestone and dolomite from Crown land five kilometres northwest of the centre of Sechelt.
The Mission Hill project is to blast and extract material that would be crushed and screened before it's stockpiled and shipped by barge from the site via Carleson Point through the Skookumchuk Narrows. There is also some chance the company will need to rely on trucks to move the mined goods down Mason Road and Norwest Bay Road.
The plan is full of holes in our opinion and we're not the only ones that think that. In January, PPA presented the exact same project to Sunshine Coast Regional District (SCRD) directors. Directors hated the plan then and they hate it now. There are so many environmental issues with this project, it's staggering. And safety? How about all of the dust, noise and dangerous potential traffic from trucks rumbling up and down Norwest Bay Road?
PPA has been trying to force its way into our community for years now. They have faced intense opposition from every level of government on the Coast and off, with our provincial and federal representatives fighting so residents' concerns can be heard.
There have been many protests, led by Save Our Sunshine Coast, and Friends of Sechelt Peninsula. PPA continues to talk a big game, and put a positive spin on their projects, but have they backed that up with action?
Just ask SCRD Halfmoon Bay director Garry Nohr, who summed up the feelings of many at last Thursday's meeting, in saying PPA will have to do a lot more to convince any of the local governments that they are a viable company with a viable project that will benefit the Sunshine Coast.
Company officials tried to re-assure the crowd that things have changed and that the same people who were with the company years ago are now gone. But we're not buying it.
This recent project that PPA is trying to get approval for simply won't fly. It's time for PPA to just go away.
