Christiana Wiens
Comox Valley Echo

Tuesday, June 10, 2008

Comox Coun. Ken Grant and Area B director Barbara Price will be soaking up more than just sunshine this summer.

The new chair and vice chair of the Comox Valley Water Supply Commission will have regional water issues to wade through as the commission moves forward on an demanding timeline set out by the provincial government.

Grant and Price were elected to lead the commission at its first meeting late last month.

A part of the regional district restructuring last February, the province mandated that a commission be formed to investigate the status of existing water supply services in the area, create a regional water supply service plan and recommend an operating structure for it, develop plans, policies and actions to manage the demand on water and protect major watersheds here.

The commission has to do all this by December 2009.

"We have a very, very aggressive timeframe to meet the minister's order," said interim facilitator Doug Allan. "We need to have active members and a more active chair and vice chair."

Allan is hoping the commission's executive will pull together some of the key issues before the commission meets again, perhaps even inviting representatives of the Capital Regional District in Victoria to the table to discuss their challenges on a similar issue so far.

"We need to have a full start on this as of the first of July," he said.

The board has a first schedule set that includes hiring a facilitator this summer, securing provincial funding this summer, host community presentations and open houses, receive an assessment of the quantity of water, and risk validation study in the fall and winter, and then have two rounds of public presentations in 2009 before presenting its findings to the Comox Valley Regional District Board.

Water, and the provision of it, has been one of the most hotly debated topics in the Valley for more than a decade - with new service paving the way for additional subdivision and development.

Though some local service areas and water districts do exist, municipal leaders in Courtenay and Comox have generally refused electoral area access to piped water from Comox Lake, without forcing the area to join the municipality.

At one point there was even an agreement between Comox and Courtenay mapping out which rural area would join which municipality as the Valley grew.

And with so much of the Valley's growth projected for as yet unserviced parts of the Comox Valley, the commission could determine the future of development here.

The commission will have a steering committee of the four chief administrative officers in the Valley and will be advised by an advisory board made up their own municipalities, the K'omoks First Nation, local improvement districts, and provincial and federal departments.

The list of 18 different organizations fails to include any environmental or water stewardship groups, landowners or companies surrounding Comox Lake, or other private water purveyors in the Valley.

Those groups will be included at the public consultation stage, said district operations manager Ron Neufeld, leaving the advisory group to tackle more technical issues.

The commission will establish a consultation strategy as one of their initial projects, said the government facilitator.

Commission vice chair Barbara Price said that some of the groups have put so much effort and study into the watershed they are different from the general public and should be treated as such.

Cumberland Coun. Bronco Moncrief issued a word of caution.

"We could end up with 20-plus groups," he said. "Until we know where we're headed why bring all these people in? I can see a place for them, I'm just a little concerned about being too big to start with."

The commission also has room for an additional non-elected members to the main committee but restricted it to the original nine members for the time being.

Area C Director Barry Minaker also argued that the commission should examine limits to local growth.

The provincial facilitator agreed.

"If the water supply has a maximum the regional growth strategy certainly needs to know that," said Allan.

WHAT'S THE DIFFERENCE?

The Comox Valley Regional District has a brand new water supply commission that met for the first time last week.

The Comox Valley Water Supply Commission is provincially mandated to look at the future water needs of the entire Valley.

Though improvement districts and outside agencies will get a chance to sit on an advisory board, it's made up of nine members, made up of all the municipalities and electoral areas here.

Its goal is to set up a regional water supply, based out of Comox Lake.

The name may sound familiar because it sounds a lot like the Comox Valley Water Committee, which deals with the operations and costs of water that already comes from Comox Lake.

Comox, Courtenay, CFB Comox and electoral area directors with constituents that get piped water from the lake make up that committee.

© Comox Valley Echo 2008