BRITISH COLUMBI. As a director of the water and waste management committee of the Greater Vancouver Regional District, I am involved in current discussions regarding a new district-wide waste management plan. Such a plan would be concerned with the collection, treatment, handling and disposal of refuse, sewage and other waste material in the whole Greater Vancouver area. That such a regional approach to gar- bage disposal is necessary has been evi- dent for a long time. At present garbage disposal is fragmented, some of it handled by municipalities and some by regional bodies such as the Greater Van- couver Regional District and the Greater Vancouver Sewerage and Drainage Dis- trict. The problems continue to mount. The Premier Street landfill in North Van- couver district, for example, is rapidly filling up and in any case the citizens who live in the vicinity don’t want it expanded. North Vancouver district wants now to dump its garbage into Vancouver’s Burns Bog, an action opposed by the city of Vancouver. Coquitlam recently had an emergency when its landfill was over- filled and it was agreed that it (and other municipalities) would use Burns Bog. But Burns Bog won't last foréver either and so the problem has not really been solved. No municipality wants its neighbor’s garbage. Two major problems face us in the disposal of garbage. The first is the cost and the second is the needless waste pro- duced by our society. Methods have been developed to dis- pose of garbage. These include incinera- tion, landfills and recycling. They are all costly and in the case of recycling there is the problem of finding a market for the recycled material. The costs of garbage disposal are going up even now with just landfills; Ottawa, Victoria should finance garbage disposal they would go up three or four times if incineration or recycling methods were adopted. That would automatically mean a huge increase in taxes which homeowners would most certainly oppose. The only solution to this problem would be provincial and/or federal fund- ing, but here again we run up against a stone wall. Garbage disposal, which is a service to citizens, is certainly not a prior- ity with either the Bennett or Mulroney governments. It will be necessary to mount a real campaign to convince both governments to change their minds. There is no other way out. The second major problem is the great amount of needless waste produced in our society where everything is packaged Harry Rankin just to make it look attractive (and the package often costs more than the con- tents) and where our society wastes bil- lions of dollars in paper and plastics. © Our western society is undoubtedly the most wasteful civilization that man- kind has seen. The amount of garbage produced in Canada and the Greater Vancouver area is growing year by year and there seems no end. This sitution will continue until we have a society where conservation is a priority. : In the meantime we'll have to go ahead with landfills, incineration and recyling and hope that we can compel Ottawa and Victoria to chip in for the enormous costs involved. ANNIVERSARY CELEBRATION Saturday, March 23, 1985 Holiday Inn, 711 W. Broadway Cocktails: 6:30 p.m. Dinner: 7:30 p.m. * Speakers: Frank Kennedy, Harry Rankin, Maurice Rush, William Kashtan * Musical Program: Tom Hawken, Steve Gidora and friends * Special presentation to founding veterans $78 regular, $10 oap, unemployed Seats still available but tickets going fast. RESERVE NOW. Call Tribune office at 251-1186 or visit Co-op Books. 2 e PACIFIC TRIBUNE, MARCH 20, 1985 Gov't cutbacks cause of fare hike on buses Last week’s announced fare hikes for the Lower Mainland’s buses are only the beginning of soaring transit costs placed on the region’s residents. When the advanced light rapid transit system (ALRT) goes into service Jan. 1 next year, Greater Vancouver residents will face a host of new costs, including a possible quadrupling of property taxes. That’s the warning city and municipal officials have sounded in the wake of the latest provincial government moves to foist more of the burgeoning transit costs onto the region. Yet the response to the latest incursions into local autonomy by the Socred govern- ment has been less than inspiring. So far, only the aldermen from Vancouver's Committee of Progressive Electors have voted against the fare hike, along with one member of the Vancouver Regional Transit Commission (VRTC). The decision Mar. 13 by the VRTC to hike the rush-hour one-zone fare to $1, along with increases in the interzonal fares followed an earlier decision in which the commission, with two Vancouver represen- tatives unavoidably absent, voted to accept changes in the funding formula that decreased the province’s share of operating costs for the region’s buses. B.C. Transit informed the commission, consisting of local civic officials chosen by the provincial cabinet, that the province was reducing its share of the costs by five per cent. (The commission replaces the former transit committee of the Greater Vancouver Regional District directors, which was composed of local elected officials chosen by the district.) The way to meet the shortfall, B.C. Tran- sit suggested, was to raise the percentage of costs recovered by revenues —mainly from the fare box — to 45.6 from 42 per cent. Last year the province’s contribution was also cut by five per cent, increasing the revenue target to 42 from the initial 35 per cent. The raises in the revenue target hurt the region because of the financial sharing for- mula. Under the original system, the revenue target was 35 per cent. Of the remaining 65 per cent, two-thirds, or 43 per cent, was funded by the province, while the region paid the remaining 22 per cent. Under the formula the region is responsi- ble for making up the shortfall if the revenue achieved dips below the target figure. Con- versely, any excess — and there have been surpluses during the past few years — is used to pay the region’s share of the remain- ing costs. Moving the target percentage upwards naturally reduces the surplus amount that can be applied to the region’s share of the deficit — hence the reason behind the fare hike. Making matters worse for the region was last year’s lockout of B.C. Transit drivers and maintenance staff during the lengthy dispute. Largely recognized as a result of intransigence on the part of the Metro Transit Operating Company — Socred MLA Bill Reid was later removed as its © head — the lockout reduced total fares from a projected 44 per cent of total costs to 37 per cent. With the 42 per cent target in place, the region was forced to make up the difference of $4 million from its own coffers. The combined effect of the raised revenue target and the revenue shortfall, stated city staff in a report, meant “the province realizes a saving of $16 million...while the region’s costs increase by $10 million.” The region — represented by the Vic- toria-picked transit commission — had @ kind of “choice.” Instead of hiking the fare target, the commissioners could have opted ‘for a 10-per cent reduction in services, entailing cancelled routes and layoffs of Metro Transit staff. “A reduction in service of this magn tude,” wrote B.C. Transit spokesman Larry Ward in a letter to transit commission members, “could only be achieved by major decreases in the frequency of service on most bus routes during all off peak periods and by virtually eliminating local service in suburban areas and only retaining the major trunk routes for regional travel after 7 p.m. in the evening and on Sundays.” The commission chose the less unpopu- lar option in raising fares, over the objec tions of commissioner and.Port Coquitlam mayor Len Trouba- — lay. The decision had been supported by a vote in Van- couver city council Mar. 12, over the objections of the four COPE alder- men: Harry Rankin, Libby Davies, Bruce Eriksen and Bruce Yorke. Voting for the fare hike were the alder men from the right-wing alliances, the Elec- tors Action Movement and the Non-Partisan BRUCE YORKE Association, along with Mayor Mike Hat- — court and Ald. Bill Yee. The effect of the Socred cutbacks in tran- sit funding have been hard enough on the region, and particularly on Vancouver resi- dents, who raise through gasoline and hydro surcharges, and commercial property — taxes, the lion’s share of the costs. But these factors pale beside the whammy that will hit Greater Vancouver when the ALRT goes on line. The costly megaproject, imposed on the region over the objections of local officials who wanted a more conventional, less costly form of rapid transit, is slated to cost at least $1 billion by completion . Van- | | couver city officials warn that “with — the. ..revenué target of 45.6 per cent, the region’s share of costs with ALRT would double from 20 to 36 per cent, nearly quad- rupling the present dollar amount...” In short, the city’s traditional revenue sources — including property tax, which may be expanded to include residential taxes — may be quadrupled to meet the ALRT burden. In response, city aldermen adopted a ser- ies of counteractions. One was the contro- versial approval of fare hikes, but others include compiling a brief to the provincial government demanding the financial for- mula be adjusted back to the original div- ision of costs: 35 per cent for the region, and - 65 per cent for the province. Council is also calling for a different for- mula for ALRT funding. They recommend combined federal and provincial grants, “either in the form of ‘highway’ funding, or elimination of senior government taxes on — ALRT construction, or alternatively pro- viding reduced interest borrowing.” “We are calling for this brief to be pro- duced quickly,” said Yorke on behalf of the COPE aldermen. The brief must go to the: | council’s finance committee before coming up for final debate in council. When that time comes, it is important that concerned community groups are represented “‘so that we can get some mus- cle in dealing with this government,” he said.