Patty On The Warpath

By Mike Archer. Abbotsford’s Lexus environmentalist is on the warpath again. Patricia Ross, who has never met a parade in front of which she won’t jump and lead just as it passes the reviewing stand, is fighting for air again.

Hot air, admittedly, but air nonetheless.

She told the Abbotsford News this week, “Metro Vancouver’s plan to build a waste-to-energy (WTE) trash incinerator, potentially in the Lower Mainland, is ‘worse than SE2.'”

According to the News “Her comments come in the wake of a fresh blast at the WTE proposal, launched by Chilliwack MLA John Les, who said the Greater Vancouver Regional District (GVRD) has forgotten that the project would still need to pass a stringent provincial environmental review process.”

Fresh off of her successful and counter-productive battle over Shark Fin Soup (please read ‘Why We Shouldn’t Ban Shark Fin‘), Patty is back to her other issue – the environment. [Sorry … didn’t mean ‘other’ … should have said ‘only’]

She even used words like ‘science’ in her interview with the News, though I suspect if you ever put some science in front of her she wouldn’t actually know you meant her to read.

The environmentalist duo of Patty and John who, together, as Chairs of the Fraser Valley Regional District (FVRD) managed to turn Sumas Mountain into a permanently ruined playground for gravel companies, are once again fighting over something they don’t quite understand.

The science she refers to has been read by people who, a) know how to read and b) understand science, and it does not show what she claims it does at all. [I’ve added links at the bottom of the post to all of the science being quoted by both sides on this issue)

We’ve said it before … Patty should stick to things she can understand instead of rushing off on battles which, were she to win them, would leave her friends and neighbours worse off for her efforts.

Her comparison of a Vancouver waste to energy incinerator to the proposed SE2 plant is misleading and untrue – except in her own mind. Both are issues which she feels she can use to keep her political career alive despite her dismal performance at the council table.

A close look at the recordings of the last eight years of council would likely reveal that Patricia Ross says ‘I’m confused’ at council meetings more often than any other phrase (or even Simon Gibson).

By opposing the waste to energy incinerator, without accounting for the millions of tons of carbon dioxide and other pollutants being spewed into the Fraser Valley by the semi trailers hauling our garbage up to the interior (yes … we pay Vancouver to drive our garbage through our own backyard Patty) she is being so disingenuous she might choke herself if she ever had to try to unravel her own logic.

For the record: While Patty fights the good fight over the inhumane killing of sharks in faraway oceans for food, she regularly fawns all over the local chicken factory owners who process millions of baby chicks in concentration camp style butchery on their way to the tables of pseudo environmentalists like her. (please read ‘Factory farming’s Days May Be Numbered‘)

For the record: The 2001 Environment Canada Air Quality Study Lower Mainland Airshed showed that the real reason for the white haze in the Fraser Valley during summer inversions has more to do with cow belches and farts than Patty’s kind of pollution.

We pulled a column from the vault published in 2010 on this exact subject. Nothing has changed. Patty still doesn’t understand the environment except as a political devise to keep herself well fed at the public trough. She hasn’t even changed her strategy of constantly equating Vancouver’s waste to energy project to SE2 except that she now says it is ‘worse’ than SE2.

‘SE2 All Over Again’ – If Only, Patricia … If Only

-July 31, 2010

By Mike Archer. Abbotsford’s environmental councillor, Patricia Ross has blown a gasket over Metro Vancouver’s decision, despite all her bogus science, to go ahead and turn their garbage into energy by building a waste-to-energy incinerator.

“This is SE2 all over again,” Ross told the Abbotsford News yesterday.

Like a chicken with her head cut off Patricia is fighting this issue as though her very life depended on it because, in her simple world, air is good – smoke is bad, make it all go away. The environment is nice; people vote for the environment so I support the environment.

She doesn’t care if she’s right or wrong she just believes in SE2 and what it did for her career.

Give her credit, her friends at the Fraser Valley Conservancy and the Abbotsford Community Foundation, who ensure she gets re-elected every three years, will rejoice at the thought of another ‘SE2 Battle’ but what impact will her delusions have on the taxpayers of Abbotsford?

Just two weeks ago Abbotsford Council voted not to support Metro’s incineration plans but both Mayor George Peary and Councillor John Smith had reservations.

Since Abbotsford pays Vancouver to accept our garbage Peary indicated he was ‘“reluctant to tell them how to run their business.”

Taking a more philosophical tone, Councillor John Smith said,“As a customer, we will pay. I fear we will pay somehow, some way.”

Ross then weighed in reportedly saying that the financial impact of the decision was important to note. No kidding Patricia. Glad you noticed.

Delta Mayor Lois Jackson

Delta Mayor and GVRD Chair Lois Jackson reportedly told Ross at a public meeting of Lower Mainland mayors on waste management May 1, that, as far as SE2 was concerned, “It was a U.S. facility with no benefit to Canada, only an impact to Canada. We said to SE2, Please go away.“You can’t say to garbage, “Please go away.”

As Chair of the FVRD Ross has allowed an asphalt plant to receive approval in Sumas, she has approved of paving the Discovery Trail through Abbotsford wilderness and has allowed a massive gravel pit operation to slip through an FVRD loophole in the pristine Chilliwack River Valley against the wishes of residents. Hardly the record of an environmentalist.

She supported the raping of Sumas mountain by the gravel companies which produce clouds of gravel dust that is visible from as far away as Chilliwack.

Her research on garbage incineration has been shown to be bogus. She doesn’t even have a reasonable explanation why she opposes Vancouver’s plans other than the fact that the fight against SE2 made her popular, so fighting something similar should work for her too.

“Abbotsford Mayor George Peary is dubious of the KPMG numbers because the study was paid for by Belcorp, operators of the Cache Creek landfill.” – Black Press

Mayor Peary seems more worried about the possible irreparable damage in the relationship with Metro Vancouver than fighting political battles for the sake of one councillor’s political future.

.

It’s time Patricia faced up to the facts and started acting as a councillor who is paid to look after the interests of the people who pay her wage.

Stop approving vanity projects that are bankrupting the city. Pay attention to the environmental costs when you cave to the gravel lobby or pave Abbotsford’s forests. Start looking after the interests of your employers – the taxpayers of Abbotsford.

If Ross really believes her battle with the GVRD is another SE2 she will waste an enormous amount of time and energy, for which we are paying, trying to slay dragons that don’t need slaying.

The simple fact is that as contributors to the Vancouver garbage she wants to fob off on somebody else, we have to come to terms with the amount of waste we create and stop shipping it elsewhere. Waste-to-energy incineration is one important step on that path but we can no longer ignore the trash we create just by giving it to someone else to deal with.

Her views have been noted. She gets full marks from those who fund her and support her. Now she should start acting like a grownup and do her job – managing the affairs of the taxpayers of Abbotsford with our interests at heart – and stop posturing on an issue she clearly doesn’t understand in a shameless bid to get re-elected.

—
For a look at the research by both parties to date see the following:

Research, Sources and Background:
We did what we could to provide as many useful links for those who want to look into the matter further.

– 2001 Environment Canada Air Quality Study Lower Mainland Airshed

Douw Steyn
– Douw Steyn
– Funding canceled

Ryley Landfill

Critique of Waste To Energy Proposals:Incinerators – Waste-to-Energy Proposals in the Watershed Sentinel by Joyce Nelson.

Fraser Valley Regional District Research:
– Consolidated FV Management Plan 1998 PDF
– Best Management Practices and emission inventory of agricultural sources in the Lower Fraser Valley
– State of the air Reports
– Dr Ian Mckendry Report-Air Quality in the Fraser Valley
– Particulate Emissions and Health – Prf C. Vyvyan Howarrd

Metro Vancouver Research:
– Solid Waste Planning
– Landfill Evaluation 2008 PDF
– Implementation Matrix PDF
– Solid Waste Management Full Report PDF
– Draft Solid Waste Implementation Plan 2010 PDF