Dear Editor:
During the last election, I decided to run because of the concerns over the land swap.
While some of the ideas behind the swap were beneficial, many were not and clearly Summerlanders rejected the land swap. We arose as a community to reject the poorly planned proposal.
And again, we find ourselves at a crossroad with the proposed compost facility.
I greatly appreciate Mayor Peter Waterman’s time in answering my questions recently as we walked the road up Giant’s Head.
I walked away clearly informed of the benefits to Summerland.
Moving our existing biowaste further from our water reservoir, into an improved modern system, and increasing our capacity would be beneficial.
The RDOS is clearly struggling with our waste issues and as members of the Okanagan community we need to do our part.
Unfortunately running trucks over the proposed route will kill the deal as very few people want to see this happen.
Many residences do not want to see this volume of traffic.
Even with the proposed road improvements, I see little benefit to the community over this route.
At the junction of Jones Flat, and Garnett Valley is an access to the backside of Cartwright Mountain. Access from the highway to the proposed facility would be direct and avoid urban areas completely.
New agricultural land would be available and new access to housing development on Cartwright Mountain would be beneficial.
A new major thoroughfare would improve access to Faulder and Meadow Valley.
The costs would be significant. By significant, I mean this would be a huge, multi-year development, with tens of millions of dollars spent.
This is the long range planning that we need from council.
The benefits to our community would be enormous and the costs would be spread over many decades at very low interest rates.
With new agricultural areas, increased employment at the facility and a portion of the development covered by the RDOS, a major portion of Summerland would finally unite and approve this.
The only downside would be to the residents who live at the entrance to Garnett Valley, but that’s what we need from our leaders is long term vision and unity.
Mark Smed
Summerland