PEOPLE POWER is a six-chaper 50 minute DVD designed to help activists launch grassroots community-based campaigns to protect public power and the environment.
Opposition Building Against Proposed Power Line in BC Park
"Tomorrow evening Pitt Meadows will be ground zero in the battle to save BC's publicly owned streams and parks," said Joe Foy, Wilderness Committee National Campaign Director.
The event is being co-hosted by Northwest Cascade Power Ltd., the proponent of the transmission line and the power projects, and the BC Ministry of Environment. The meeting will be held at the Ramada Inn in Pitt Meadows at 19267 Lougheed Highway (east of Harris Road). It will run from 4:00pm to 9:00pm, with a question and answer session from 6:30-8:30pm.
"The Upper Pitt project exemplifies everything wrong with BC's Energy Plan; a proponent is poised to make a windfall by causing environmental damage for power that BC doesn't even need, and the BC government is bending over backwards to help them do so," said Andy Ross, President of the COPE 378, which represents workers in the energy sector.
Public concern over private hydro projects has grown since 2002 when the BC government announced a new energy plan that forbade BC Hydro from producing new sources of hydroelectricity. This policy led to a gold rush by private power producers to stake rivers and creeks for power production. Since 2001 over 60 water licenses have been granted for private hydro projects and 433 additional applications are pending.
"The proposed development on the Upper Pitt-and hundreds of similar private power projects under consideration-will result in skyrocketing electricity rates for BC residents and the destruction of our precious natural resources " said Melissa Davis, Executive Director of BC Citizens for Public Power.
The Wilderness Committee is renting a bus to take people to tonight's meeting. The bus will arrive in Pitt Meadows at 7:00pm. The rental of the bus was necessary because Northwest Cascade Power, rather than the Ministry of Environment, decided no open houses were to be held in Vancouver or Coquitlam. When Pinecone Burke Provincial Park, located just 35 kilometers northeast of Vancouver, was first established in 1995, public meetings held by the Ministry of Environment in both Vancouver and Port Coquitlam, were attended by hundreds of people.
Elaine Golds, Conservation Chair of the Burke Mountain Naturalists said, "This project, with its proposed transmission line through pristine wilderness in a Class A Park, would set a shocking precedent and lead to more industrial intrusions into provincial parks across BC. There is where we must draw the line in the sand and stand up to protect our parks and wild salmon habitat."
Situated in the heart of Katzie First Nation territory, the Upper Pitt Valley is an ecological treasure. It supports the largest remaining wild coho population in the lower Fraser and has a unique race of sockeye. It provides habitat for all species of Pacific salmon plus steelhead, cutthroat trout, Dolly Varden and the largest population of bull trout remaining in the lower mainland. The Upper Pitt River Valley also attracts grizzly bears, wolves, marbled murrelets, wolverine and mountain goats.
Residents in the lower Fraser Valley unable to attend the Pitt Meadows meeting have the option of attending the same meeting in Mission on Tuesday, March 4 at the Western Mission City Lodge. People unable to attend meetings can submit comments opposing the project and transmission line through Pinecone Burke Park until April 2 to PineconeBurke@gov.bc.ca.
For more information please contact:
Joe Foy, Wilderness Committee, 604-683-8220 (w) or 604-880-2580 (c)
Elaine Golds, Burke Mountain Naturalists, 604-937-3483
Melissa Davis, BC Citizens for Public Power, 604- 681-5939
Mike Bruce, COPE 378, 604-812-904
Diana Williams, Pitt Polder Preservation Society, 604-465-8038
Carleen Pickard, Regional Organizer, Council of Canadians, 604-340-2455
Duanne Vandenberg, Alouette Field Naturalists, 604-463-8743
Jakub Drnec or Jan Dettmer, BC Creek Protection Society, 250-382-3499