At its' August 26th meeting, Williams Lake Council gave its' go-ahead to award a new 5 year contract to Central Cariboo Disposal for the City's Garbage/Recycling program. The City's New Recycling Program will be door-to-door, via City provided bins and residents will be allowed to place all recyclables' in one bin and the Contractor will sort out the different recyclables, which will now make the jointly funded City/CRD Recycle Bins for both Rural/City residents' redundant. According to the WL Tribune, Brian Carruthers (City's General Manager of Community Services) was quoted as saying:
"We have a funding arrangement with the CRD to operate the Transfer Station and they would assume responsibility.”
He notes that that is something the City still needs to talk to the CRD about, however, as it is only a suggestion at this point."
Area 'F' Director Duncan Barnett raised a concern (and frankly, he was rather excited) about the above quote, at the CRD Board on Friday, August 29th, and felt Staff/City were rushing ahead without consulting with Central Cariboo Directors and was not respecting CRD Board motions on recycling. Quite frankly, Mr. Barnett should get off his "high-horse" and recognize that the City of Williams Lake has said, with respect to the Recycling Bins, that negotiations will take place around financial responsibility for those bins. Quite rightly, with the City having a door-to-door recycling program, I would expect that the City wouldn't want to continue help paying for the bins, however there may be opportunities to partner with the City on getting cardboard, plastics and other recyclables (if appropriate) to Quesnel, via locally placed recycle bins at all Transfer Stations in Areas D, E and F. So, let's all work together to provide maximum recycling opportunities for all residents, not beat our chest just because of what we read in the local newspapers' and why Staff failed to respect motions, etc. Cooperation is always better than confrontation
I was recently informed that starting September 10th from 4-7 at the Gibraltar Room, the Central Cariboo Arts Council will host an "Open House" as to why the "Central Cariboo Arts and Culture Function Bylaw - CRD Bylaw 4420" is necessary. More Open-Houses are planned at their temporary home - Heritage House. Ads for these Open-Houses are set to roll out this week. At this point, I have no information that suggests that the local Arts Council intends to have Open Houses at Miocene, Wildwood, 150 Mile, Horsefly/Likely. In my opinion, that is a big mistake, in terms of open, honest communication for the following three reasons.
1) 4-7pm - most people are still working so you won't get a huge capture of the voters' which may have questions on this new Function including why this is necessary, where other alternatives considered, etc
2) It is far easier for people to drive to their local community hall for various Regional District Initiatives than making them drive from Horsefly/Likely, Miocene, 150 Mile after work back to WL.
3) WL Arts Council Website (http://www.wlarts.ca) - this Website is in its' infancy, yet September 10th is coming up fast and you would think that the local Arts Council would have its' information up as to why the Arts and Culture Function needs to occur
Bottom Line - This Function should be withdrawn and all other options for supporting Arts and Culture should be looked at with a full, consultative process used to ensure residents' have maximum opportunities to state their views on whether or not taxpayers' should/shouldn't support Arts and Culture and other non-profit groups and under what conditions
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