Blog Wrap Up

It has certainly been an eventful summer for the sewage treatment issue in Victoria. After years of inaction and vague promises, a concrete plan has been put in place which calls for sewage treatment by the year 2016. Although this distant deadline provides an opportunity for incoming politicians to backtrack on the treatment promise, it seems the days of Victoria turning a blind eye to the practise of dumping raw sewage into the ocean have finally come to an end. The focus of the sewage issue now turns towards the complicated and possibly arduous task of land acquisition for treatment facilities, along with holding the provincial and federal governments to their promises for funding (Seeing as two-thirds of the funding for sewage treatment is coming from these two sources). It will also be interesting to see how city residents react when they see their municipal taxes increase to pay for treatment. Regardless, Victoria has finally adopted a liquid waste management plan that is modern, environmentally friendly, and eliminates an embarrassing legacy that the city, and its valuable tourism industry, have had to downplay for years.