INDIAN _ RIVER AREA Fast funding for NVD school may be stalled FUNDING ASSURED by the province for the fast-track construction of a new Indian River area elementary school may not come through in time for an anticipated September 1989 school opening. North Vancouver Schoo! District 44 officials had reached an understanding with the provincial Ministry of Education earlier this year that money would be released “The education minister is still keen to facilitate. It’s really a case of prevailing upon the treasury board to release the funds. ’”’ in 1988 to cover the construction of the school. But the provincial treasury board has since indicated the money is not available for release this year. North Vancouver School District superintendent Dr. Leo Marshall said North Vancouver-Scymour MLA Jack Davis is scrambling this weekend at the Socred convention in Penticton to lobby to get the funding and school construction schedule back on track. Said Marshall: ‘‘The understan- Business .............. 23 Classified Ads..........43 Doug Collins........... 9 Comies................42 Editerial Page.......... 6 Fashion ............... 15 Bob Hunter............ 4 Lifestyles..............39 Mailbox .... TV Listings............29 Travel.... saceeee 34 What's Going On........12 WEATHER oo? Sunday and Monday, rain. Tuesday, periods of rain. Highs near 13°C. Second Class Registration Number 3885 By MICHAEL BECKER News Reporter ding we had from the Ministry of Education was that they would make every effort to release funds to us for a building start this year, if we could acquire and clear the if the construction money doesn’t come through from the treasury board in 1988, Marshall said the district would likely receive the money next year and the school would not be opened until the fall of 1990. North Vancouver District has already zoned the site for school use. The school has been designed, and the province has approved $1.5 million for purchase of the schoo} site this year. But a price and offer for the Jand have yet to be hammered out. Said Marshall: ‘If $1.5 million is not enough for the land pur- chase, we'll have to go back to the ministry and ask for more money.’ The cost for the Indian River school land purchase and construction had been originally estimated at approximately $4 mil- lion. Said Marshall: ‘‘The education minister is still keen to facilitate. It’s really a case of prevailing upon the treasury board to release the funds.”’ A North Vancouver delegation of residents, school officials and politicians met mid-December with Education Minister Tony Brum- mett to ask for a replacement for Deep Cove’s Burrard View school and the construction of a school in Indian River that would include kindergarten-to-Grade-7 French immersion :=struction. PAT SCRIVENER of the Friends of the Library looks as though she’s shopping for a good deal on reading material. What Scrivener is really doing, however, is helping (he West Vancouver Memorial Library move some of its books from its overcrowded facility to Hillside Secondary School. 3 - Sunday, October 23, 1988 - North Shore News va NEWS photo Mike Waketield lorth Shore input sought on waste management plan A MASSIVE upgrade of the Greater Vancouver Regional Disirict’s sewage system could cost as much as $1.5 billion and increase general municipal taxes of the North Shore and other Lower Mainland communities by as much as 50 per cent. The estimates are contained in the recently-released draft report for stage one of the GVRD’s Greater Vancouver Liquid Waste Management Plan. GVRD officials will be seeking North Shore input to the plan in a Wednesday, Oct. 26 public meeting at the Silver. Harbour Centre Auditorium, 144 East 22nd St., North Vancouver, starting at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday’s meeting is the first in a series of public information meetings scheduled to be held around the Lower Mainland fol- lowing release of the draft report, which also estimates that upgrade of all four GVRD sewage treat- ment plants, including the North Shore’s Lions Gate plant, to sec- ondary treatment would cost more than $425 million and add $16 mil- lion annually to the system’s eperating costs. The overall purpose of the liquid waste study is to determine how well existing sewage facilities can By TIMOTHY RENSHAW News Reporter handle current and future waste water flows from all sources, and to develop the most environmen- tally-acceptable disposal and treatment plan for the burgeoning amount of liquid wastes produced by the North Shore and other Lower Mainland communities. In addition, the study will exam- ine regional water quality and water uses, sewer source control and the effect on area sewage qual- ity from contaminated land runoff such as oil and agricultural pesticides. While projected tax increases in individual municipalities from the sewer overhaul could be higher or lower than the 40 to 50 per cent estimated for each of the GVRD’s four sewerage areas, GVRD spokesman Bud Elsie said Friday those variations would be small. Municipalities and the GVRD the currently bear capital and operating costs of Lower Mainland sewers and sewage treatment plants. In a June 5 News story chronicl- ing the operation of the Lions Gate facility, deputy GVRD engineer Brian Talbot estimated the cost to upgrade the plant to secondary treatment would be between $40 million and $50 million and add several million dollars annually to its operating costs. Elsie said Friday the regional district, without financial help from the provincial and federal governments, will not be able to afford the investment needed for a major sewer system overhaul. He said sewer improvements benefited such provincial and fed- eral responsibilities as environment and fisheries, ‘tbut they’re (the two levels of government) not giving us acent.”’ Among the liquid waste plan’s Stage-one proposals are the elimination of sludge discharges through the Lions Gate effluent outfall by 1991, and implementa- tion of effluent dechlorination at the plant by 1990. The Lions Gate plant is current- ly permitted to discharge with other clarified liquid effluent a maximum of 24,000 gallons of treated sludge on designated days over a two-hour period, one hour after ebb tide. Its outfall is ap- proximately 800 feet offshore and 90 feet below the First Narrows. Chlorine is added to outgoing sewage from May to September. The plant, which services the en- tire North Shore from Horseshoe Bay to Deep Cove, processes an average daily raw sewage flow of 17 million gallons from 140,000 customers. Stage one of the GVRD’s liquid waste management plan concludes ‘hat more information is needed in suck areas as the environmental impact from sewage plants and_ urban runoff on marine environ- ments before the size and scope of a major sewer facility overhaul can be determined. Elsie said the information meetings will present residents with the current and projected liquid waste situation and invite reaction and input. Recommendations culled from stage-one data will be included in the study’s second stage, which is scheduled for completion some- time next spring. For more information on the report or Wednesday’s meeting call the GVRD at 432-6200.