The following letter was sent to Julie Clark, education and outreach co-ordinator for the Sunshine Coast Regional District's (SCRD) waste management program, and copied to Coast Reporter.
As a former director and a founding member of SCRAPS, I am concerned about the SCRD's recycling plans for the Sunshine Coast. Though I live in Gibsons and thus will not be taking part in the recycling survey, I still feel I am a stake-holder as an inhabitant of the planet and also because Gibsons council shows signs of copying whatever the SCRD intends to do.
I would like to know what your qualifications are - particularly with regard to serious research and hands-on experience with recycling. My fear is that your talents might lie mainly in PR and that the intent of the survey and the information materials sent out may have, as their goal, a certain outcome on the survey.
I am especially concerned about where the recyclables will end up after curbside pick-up that is perhaps to be single stream. How much will end up in the dump, and how much will be trucked elsewhere? I am also concerned that the SCRD's "recycling" methods so far have resulted in the Gibsons Recycling Depot being no longer able to take most common recyclable items.
I was happy with the integrity shown by the Gibsons Recycling Depot. I am less happy with putting my recyclables in the SCRD bins, especially considering their staff's lack of action and concern over e-waste at the landfill and their reluctance to direct people to the licensed e-waste facility until a story appeared in Coast Reporter.
Anne Miles
Gibsons
