Editor:
Imagine my surprise on reading last week’s Coast Reporter (“Emergency water plan in the works”) to see Brian Shoji, general manager of SCRD Infrastructure Services, partially blaming the water shortage on Jason Herz of the Sunshine Coast Conservation Association, 40 attendees at a September 2014 SCRD meeting and myself of the Tetrahedron Alliance.
How odd. As Mayor Milne pointed out last week, the SCRD has made “absolutely no real progress on solutions for water over a 12-year period.” It is true that the directors of the SCRD have not resolved the problem and it is equally true that Mr. Shoji and his water management staff have not provided either a long or short-term sustainable solution.
The nub of the issue is actually simple. We need to achieve water conservation and diversify our supply!
Expecting over 21,000 water users, a growing population and salmon to derive water from one creek system is irrational. Since Chapman Creek has already experienced around 300 slides, further development of supply from this unstable source is questionable. Sucking more water from the lake will expose significant alluvion from its east end which could cause serious siltation in our water system when fall rains come.
How to diversify? Unfortunately, this will cost money. However, the directors need to do something significant that will provide a sustainable resolution.
Mr. Herz and I offered six interim and long-term suggestions about improving the water supply without gutting the ecological integrity in and around Chapman Lake in Tetrahedron Provincial Park. Most pertinent and affordable now, the RD could subsidize a program of 2,000-gallon residential rainwater storage tanks. And please study the significant potential aquifers in the RD.
We were told at the SCRD meeting that staff should incorporate our suggestions in an Alternative Options Report which the consultants were to make available in early 2015. So what happened?
George Smith, Gibsons
