Harm to Tourism ?
Argument:
Victoria 's reputation as a polluter does not enhance tourism, especially among the residents of Washington State. In 2003, the BC tourism industry brought in nearly $10 billion; reductions in this revenue because of Victoria's growing reputation as a polluter will be felt throughout the province. On the other hand, we have an opportunity to become a showcase for advanced sewage treatment and resource recovery processes if we take steps now to develop land based sewage treatment.
Counter Argument:
There is no evidence that Victoria’s tourism industry is threatened by our current natural sewage treatment system, nor that it would benefit from any further sewage and sludge plant construction. The problems of tourism in the CRD (passports, aging attractions, costs of transportation, etc) will not be solved by saddling the CRD with land based sewage treatment plants and sludge (biosolids) disponsal problems.
Analysis :
Locating an additional sewage plant at Clover Point is unlikely to become a tourism attraction, and several years of construction disruption in the Fairfield-Clover Point area won't likely help tourism either.
Puget Sound remains contaminated, in spite of several decades of secondary sewage treatment. However, has Seattle's reputation as a "green city" suffered because of its inability to stop contamination of Puget Sound? The contamination migrating from Puget Sound into our own waters has been measured.
If Victoria is unique because of our present natural sewage treatment system, its unlikely that we'll be seeing any more tourists show up after we adopt the common sewage treatment system of a thousand other cities in North America. So-called "resource recovery" ideas are being built around Canada and the US and can't be expected to be an interesting tourism destination magnet for Victoria, even if some tourists actually would prefer to pass up a day at Butchart's Gardens in favour of getting access to a complex and dangerous sewage plant facility.
It is difficult to imagine how spending $1.2 Billion of taxpayers money on Land Based Sewage Treatment will enhance tourism. Will a sewage treatment plant be a tourist attraction? It would be better to spend the money on something that might be a tourist attraction such as an opera house on the waterfront.