Let’s take it from the top again, and this time, let’s get it right. The provincial government has recommended that technical experts take over from the politicians in planning and implementing the region’s sewage-treatment project, and the Capital Regional District board agreed.
The decision came about after Community Minister Peter Fassbender met with the CRD board Wednesday.
The billion-dollar project has been stalled while those in charge have wandered aimlessly about in the wilderness in a Monty Python-esque search for the Holy Grail — a magical sewage plant that will please everyone, on a site that will offend no one. It’s long past time the province stepped in with a firm hand to get the project back on track.
It’s a reset to 2012, when the Capital Regional District’s wastewater committee set out to recruit a seven-member commission of experts to oversee the design and development of the system that would see an end to the region discharging raw sewage into the ocean.
We hope the déjà vu ends there — we would not want to see a rerun of the series of missteps and conflicts that derailed the project, likely adding greatly to its cost.
While the province presented the technical-panel concept as a recommendation, it is more than that — placing control in the hands of a quasi-independent panel of experts was a condition of the province’s $248-million share of the sewage-treatment bill. The handwriting is on the wall, and it’s the same handwriting that signs large cheques.
And it’s the right thing to do. Planning and building a massive sewage plant is an engineering process, not a political process. While the public needs to be kept informed and concerns need to be heard, the project must be done by qualified experts.
While the sewage committee has expended much energy over the past 18 months or so, it has been largely wasted energy. Two persons appointed by the province to assess the project found the process was plagued by a confusion of roles and responsibilities, a lack of technical expertise and the complete absence of a project plan.
The technical panel will need to function free from political concerns and parochial disputes. At the top of the list is the choice of siting, for it would be insanity to proceed without settling on a site. No contractor would invest time and money in bidding for a project without a site being secured.
CRD board chairwoman and Esquimalt mayor Barb Desjardins said the new project board “will benefit from the work that we have done, so they’re not going to have to reinvent anything.”
Good point. The panel should immediately take advantage of the planning and designing done — at a cost of more than $70 million — before the project was derailed by Esquimalt’s refusal to making a zoning change to McLoughlin Point. Experts decided four years ago that the best plan is a single plant at that location. If that’s still the expert opinion, then that’s where it should go and the province should stand firmly behind that decision.
And trying to persuade the federal and provincial governments to change their minds about requiring sewage treatment isn’t an option. Let’s not waste breath on that subject.
You can’t fault Desjardins and Victoria Mayor Lisa Helps for trying to get public consensus on the siting and design of the sewage plant, but that was an impossible dream. It’s time to face the hard reality that no matter what is built and where, someone will object, someone will be unhappy.
Time is short. Let’s get this project back on track and keep it there.
