Four years ago during his bid for re-election, John Dooley talked about municipal composting. He said it was the next City of Nelson waste-related priority after implementing curbside pickup of recycling and the relocation of the transfer station to Grohman Narrows.
Since that time, the RDCK has drafted a plan that would see them build a regional composting facility and leave pickup to the municipalities such as Nelson and Castlegar. The City of Nelson, however, has not been active in forwarding this endeavor.
In fact, I sometimes wonder if some councillors are aware of their role in the regional plan at all and if the administration would rather the whole thing just go away. In 2003, 2005, 2010, and 2017 significant taxpayer-funded plans and reports were produced that recommended solutions for municipal composting in our area.
At this point, we do not need more vague, repetitive discussions that go nowhere, or money going into another expensive report that ends up collecting dust. Best practices are established. A regional plan is in place. We need commitment, leadership, and implementation planning from the next council. The RDCK is pretty well ready to go.
The next city administration now needs to be firmly on board. In a few weeks, EarthMatters.ca will be submitting a petition to local governments demanding implementation of a regional composting solution. I hope anyone wanting to finally get something done on municipal composting will sign the petition online and/or make this an election issue, because the alternative could easily be another four years of kicking the can down the road.
Bruce Edson
Nelson