Victoria cleans up its act with wastewater plant
Capital area has been dumping its sewage straight into sea for more than a century
Victoria and surrounding municipalities are no longer dumping untreated sewage into the ocean.
Washington Gov. Jay Inslee, who has a house on Bainbridge Island, is among those welcoming news that, after four years of construction, the Capital Regional District's $775-million wastewater treatment project has begun treating sewage at the McLoughlin Point plant.
“I was wondering why the water looked so clean in front of my house in Bainbridge here,” Inslee quipped in a recorded video call with Premier John Horgan.
“I don't live actually on the shore, but I know we're going to enjoy the fruits of your leadership. I know that you played a role in this, as did our predecessors.”
Horgan replied that it took “an awful lot of people over an awful lot of decades, but we finally did the right thing.”
Victoria began dumping sewage into the Strait of Juan de Fuca in 1894, but Horgan said the “socalled perfect flush” worked better for B.C.'s capital city than it did for its neighbours.
Colin Plant, who chairs the CRD board, said district officials have been running system checks for the past month to make sure everything was working properly. “But we are now in a position to say we will be treating our wastewater from now on, into the future, forever.”
It's an important milestone given that not too long ago people were threatening a tourism boycott of Victoria as long as it kept dumping its sewage into the strait, he said.
“So welcome. Come on back.” Plant said the McLoughlin Point plant will exceed federal and provincial regulatory requirements for treating sewage from Victoria, Oak Bay, Saanich, Esquimalt, View Royal, Langford, Colwood and the Esquimalt and Songhees First Nations. “We're pleased to be able to say to the residents that we are treating our wastewater beyond what is required (in order) to do what is right for the oceans and our environment,” he said.
The McLoughlin Point plant, which has the capacity to handle population growth, will treat the equivalent of 43 Olympic-sized swimming pools of wastewater every day to a tertiary level, one of the highest standards possible, the CRD said.
James Skwarok, who used to make public appearances as the man-sized turd, Mr. Floatie, to draw attention to Victoria's sew
age mess, welcomed the CRD's announcement.
“Our initial group called POOP — People Opposed to Outflow Pollution — I think we were very successful in raising attention or awareness that Victoria needed sewage treatment, and we did it in a fun way,” he said.
“I think we're all very happy that it's finally done and that we now have tertiary treatment. We know that our marine environment will be healthier for it, and we're very proud that we could help bring this project to fruition.”
As part of the project, a residuals treatment facility at Hartland Landfill will convert leftover sludge into Class A biosolids, which will be used as fuel by a cement plant in the Lower Mainland.
Some construction work continues, but is expected to conclude by spring. More than 650 people worked at 24 sites during the peak construction period, the CRD said.
The CRD spent $316 million on the $775-million project, with another $248 million coming from the province and $211 million from the federal government.
It was April 1993. The setting, the Washington state capital of Olympia. Premier Mike Harcourt met Washington Gov. Mike Lowry to discuss a matter as contentious as it was unsavoury.
“The B.C. capital believes in using an international waterway as its toilet,” in the memorable words of Joel Connelly, columnist for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer.
Connelly, a formidable media voice on both sides of the border, had been raising a stink about Victoria's long-standing practice of dumping raw sewage into the Strait of Juan de Fuca.
The backlash had already led to travel cancellations and the threat of a full-blown tourism boycott. Harcourt was determined to head off any further damage, telling the Washington governor and news media that Victoria would be treating its sewage within 15 years.
“They just wanted to be assured we were going to proceed with sewage treatment and it was real,” he told B.C. reporters in declaring the “two Mikes” summit a success. “I was able to show them that the provincial government is real about that.”
But not real enough to develop a firm plan to begin treating the sewage within the 15-year time frame. By the 10th anniversary of Harcourt's vow, the capital region seemed more inclined to its original 25-year time table.
Enter Mr. Floatie. Starting in 2004, the sewage treatment debate in Victoria was increasingly framed by James Skwarok, a university student who showed up at events dressed up as a huge brown (natch) floatie, topped by a jaunty white sailor's cap.
“I'm Mr. Floatie, the ocean poo, if you live in Victoria, I come from you,” warbled the self-styled representative of People Opposed to Outfall Pollution (POOP — get it?).
Though some Victorians responded like, well, Victorians (“disgusting” “juvenile”), most welcomed the opening to play the long-running controversy for laughs.
Some places had a town fool, but only Victoria had a town stool. “He's really made a big splash,” said one cabinet minister.
The kids loved him. Reporters revelled in the opportunity to interview a public figure who actually admitted to being a turd.
But it was also an astonishingly effective combination of performance art and political satire. Along with a renewed outcry south of the border, Mr. Floatie helped turn the tide of public opinion in favour of treatment.
By 2006, there was a 10-year target date for completion of the project and the federal, provincial and regional governments were lined up to cost-share construction.
Then-premier Gordon Campbell backed up the treatment plan with a pledge to then-Washington governor Christine Gregoire in exchange for her state's support for Vancouver hosting the 2010 Winter Olympics.
Mr. Floatie retired. But that proved to be premature.
Clearing was already underway on the chosen site for the treatment plant at the entrance to Victoria harbour in 2014 when the host municipality, Esquimalt, refused to approve the necessary zoning for construction.
Back to square one they went. The project manager was packed off with a $500,000 payout. The nifty Seaterra logo, with its whiff of ocean breezes and earth tones, was put into storage. And the region began looking around for alternative sites. There being none better, eventually they ended up back at the same spot at the entrance to the harbour, this time with a revised plan that needed no further approval from Esquimalt.
With construction underway for real in 2017, Victoria Mayor Lisa Helps called Mr. Floatie out of retirement, bundled him onto a plane, costume and all, and flew him down to Seattle to announce the news.
When Jay Inslee, successor to Washington governors Lowry, Gregoire and several others, addressed the B.C. legislature three years ago, he tipped his hat to the construction site he'd overflown before his plane landed in the harbour.
All this came as a relief to me personally. Through 30 years as a regular commentator on Canadian news on KUOW, the NPR station in Seattle, I was always being asked, politely but persistently, “When are you folks in Victoria going to start treating your sewage?” Now I could say it was in the works.
Then came Wednesday's frontpage headline in the Victoria Times Colonist: “Our raw sewage is no longer flowing into the ocean.”
Twenty-seven years after B.C. promised to get it done within 15 years, and at a cost of almost $800 million, the capital's wastewater treatment project was finally treating wastewater.
Normally the news would have meant a ribbon cutting and speeches all around. But given pandemic restrictions, Gov. Inslee and Premier John Horgan made do with a video conference call.
Horgan: “It took an awful lot of people over an awful lot of decades, but we finally did the right thing.”
Inslee: “I was wondering why the water looked so clean (near) my house on Bainbridge Island.”
Connelly, who retired last summer after 47 years with the Post-Intelligencer, marked the news with an online posting: “The Strait Poop: `Victoria Flush' is No Longer.”
And Mr. Floatie played it straight for a change. “We're very happy that it's finally done,” the former POOP spokesman told Lindsay Kines of the Times Colonist. “Our marine environment will be healthier for it, and we're very proud that we could help bring this project to fruition.” Does he still have the suit? I wonder. If so, maybe they can find a place for it in the foyer of the treatment plant.