EDRF Highlights – What’s new with the Environmental Dispute Resolution Fund
The Environmental Dispute Resolution Fund (EDRF) continues to support individuals and groups dealing with real environmental problems. This month we feature three new and exciting cases funded by the EDRF in the last few months:
Challenging Log Booming in Sensitive Vancouver Island Estuary
Estuaries are places where rivers meet the sea and are unique and critical areas in the coastal environment. Representing only three percent of BC’s coastline, estuaries provide essential food, cover, migratory corridors, and breeding and nursery areas for a broad array of coastal and marine organisms.
The Nanaimo estuary is the largest on Vancouver Island and part of the traditional territory of the Sneneymuxw First Nation. Historically, the First Nation had longhouses along the beach of the estuary and the area remains of cultural and ecological importance to the Sneneymuxw. Oral and other history documents the immense productivity of the Nanaimo estuary until the provincial government started renting out parts of the estuary for log booms.
The log booms have, over the years, disrupted fish habitat and fundamentally changed the character of the estuary. The Sneneymuxw are hopeful that even now the estuary can be recovered, and have entered into negotiations with the province to reduce the number of logs boomed in the area. However, despite an agreement the Sneneymuxw negotiated with the provincial government to begin reducing the number of log booms in the estuary, the province has announced its intentions to grant a new 20-year log booming lease.
The Sneneymuxw, while accepting that log booming must be phased out over time, objected to a 20-year commitment to further use of the estuary in this manner. They have commenced an action in the B.C. Supreme Court and have filed for an injunction to prevent the province from entering into the new lease. The injunction hearing was scheduled for January 26th and 27th in Victoria. The court action is only one part of the Sneneymuxw First Nation’s plans to remediate the estuary. They have initiated a multi-stakeholder planning process and are working with various experts to design and carry out plans to restore the estuary’s ecological integrity.
Stopping Hazardous Sludge near Quesnel
Ruth and Al Thideman live in Kersley, a small town on the outskirts of Quesnel. The EDRF recently funded this couple to investigate the legal aspects of the Quesnel River Pulp Co. spreading hazardous sludge adjacent to their home. A year ago, this mill obtained a permit to spread pulp mill sludge on a forested parcel of land immediately upslope from the Thidemans’ residence. The forest is part of the Kersley/Menzinger Creek watershed and blankets a steep rise up from the Thidemans’ home.
The parcel owned by the mill is considered a winter storage site and the surface application and trenching of sludge is a trial experiment. The quantity of sludge spread on the land - approximately 600 loads - risks contaminating the ambient air and becoming a breeding ground to fungi and bacteria. Local residents report seeing material downslope in local watercourses, which would pose a real threat to threatening fish, wildlife, and cattle owned by the Thidemans and others.
Currently, a second application is before the Waste Management branch of the Ministry of Water, Land, and Air Protection in Williams Lake to continue the experiment this winter. The company’s long-term intent is to make this site a discharge area for several years. The Thidemans are concerned about the composition of the sludge and its potential health impacts. A large number of environmental groups in the province have monitored pulp mill impacts extensively and assert that the sludge is harmful to people and the environment. The waste resulting from secondary treatment of pulp mill waste water contains a mix of hundreds of chemicals. Benzene, phenolics, and heavy metals are among the components. Environmental advocates contend that this sludge contains a wide range of poorly understood chemicals, including a large amount of material that cannot be identified. In fact, the Pulp, Paper, and Woodworkers of Canada has called for sludge to be treated as regulated “hazardous waste” until the industry can prove through valid scientific testing that there are no ill side effects to workers.
The Thidemans are also concerned about the procedures the company has followed in applying the sludge to the land surface. This spring, the Thidemans were unhappy to note debris going into a domestic water intake. Ruth Thideman has been struggling with an illness her doctor has diagnosed as “chemical pneumonia”, and has attributed her problems to the chemicals running downslope into her water supply and diffusing over her property in the ambient air.
Along with the substantive concerns, the Thidemans feel that the process followed by the mill company was unsatisfactory. There was a notice of intent in the local paper in 2002 that went unnoticed until fall of 2003 when the company published another notice regarding their application for the annual permit. However, the company did not directly notify neighbouring landowners or water license holders of the sludge application or of its composition.
Upon reading this notice, local residents were deeply concerned about the issue and contacted the Ministry of Water, Land, and Air Protection. The Ministry arranged a meeting to which only invitees could attend. Invited residents participated but were dismayed by the experience. For the most part, residents felt that the Quesnel Pulp Mill representatives invited by the Ministry used the meeting as an opportunity to placate residents about why there was no problem, rather than listening and responding to the residents’ legitimate concerns. The Thidemans and a group of concerned neighbors have formed a group and prepared maps and other background information for the Ministry. With their EDRF funding, the group has retained Prince George lawyers Bill Coller and Ben LeVine to provide them with a legal opinion on how they can stop the spreading of the pulp mill sludge and ensure that the soil is not altered on this site in future. An appeal of the permit has been filed with the Environmental Appeal Board.
Raising a Stink over Proposed Landfill in Ashcroft
Ranchers, business owners, and residents in the Ashcroft area have a few short years left to enjoy pristine grasslands and an intact ecosystem and airshed on a large 42,000 ha expanse of land known as the Ashcroft Ranch. Two years ago, the Greater Vancouver Regional District purchased the Ranch site and initiated planning for a landfill large enough to house a century-span of accumulated waste. At least 200 ha of the ranch site have been designated for the landfill proper. The site lies within a mile of District residents and is scheduled to open for operations in 2007, replacing the Cache Creek Landfill. The construction of the Ashcroft landfill will continue the long term unsustainable flow of garbage from the Lower Mainland to the north Thompson region.
A core group of concerned community members, known as the Cornwall Watershed Coalition, have banded together to take issue with the landfill proposal. The Ashcroft First Nation has also expressed its opposition. As the process has unfolded, the Coalition has found itself in the middle of a tangle of political and legal concerns. While the Ashcroft Ranch is currently part of the Thompson Nicola Regional District (Area I), the Village of Ashcroft applied for a boundary extension to bring the proposed landfill site into its jurisdictional fold. Village and Regional District area citizens alike are frustrated by lack of transparency and information on the part of the Village and the GVRD about possible environmental risks and hazards associated with the landfill.
The potential risks and losses have motivated the Coalition to act. A pristine and vulnerable acquifer. Possible food-chain contamination. Risks of underground methane fires and explosions. Loss of quality food-producing land. Loss of archeogically significant artifacts. Possible air pollution and noxious odours. These concerns have been raised by petition to the Village and in meetings and delegations with the City of Vancouver and the GVRD Solid Waste Committee. The EDRF has recently provided funding for the Coalition to obtain a legal opinion on the options available to help them oppose the GVRD’s plan and address procedural issues in the process followed to date by the Village of Ashcroft.
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