COURTENAY, B.C. – A local environmental group is looking to do something about the garbage that is piling up along the banks of Millard Creek.
The creek is close to a homeless camp in a wooded area behind the Courtenay Walmart.
“(People) have left quite a lot of garbage, some of which is actually on the creek banks and going into the water,” said Tanis Gower of the Millard Piercy Watershed Stewards.
“We’ve been aware of it for a while and we’ve been talking about it with the city.”
The area is located on private land so the City of Courtenay staff don’t have the authority to clean the garbage up, according to Gower.
“But we as volunteers are going to go in and organize a volunteer clean-up and one of our members is a farmer with a tractor, which he’ll bring to take out the stuff, and the city has agreed to dispose of it,” she said.
A cleanup party is being planned for next week, but the exact date is still to be determined.
“We’re in the midst of organizing when that is going to happen,” Gower said. “I think it is (going to be) sooner than later because we’ve figured out how we`re going to deal with it and we have the city’s agreement to take the garbage away.”
The Millard Piercy Watershed is located on the outskirts of and encompasses 13 square kilometers with roughly 55 kilometers of watercourses, including ditches.
The two main watercourses: Millard and Piercy Creeks, originate in wetlands and in underground springs.
