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Wednesday, Feb. 13, 2013 PM40008236
Vol. 54 No. 7 Sicamous, B.C., • 1.25 (HST included) • www.eaglevalleynews.com
Community anxious for creek repair
Hummingbird Creek: Province assures work will be done soon to alleviate flood risk. By Lachlan Labere Eagle Valley News
Swansea Point residents are feeling cautiously optimistic that work will finally be done to repair Hummingbird Creek and alleviate the risk of further flooding. On Feb. 6, Tina and Dan Keely and other Swansea Point residents received a letter from Premier Christy Clark’s executive officer, Cameron Lewis, assuring work would soon begin to repair the creek, left full of debris from a flash flood that occurred over the summer. The letter arrived the same morning BC NDP Safety Critic Kathy Corrigan came to tour the area. “Just before we went on the tour, this letter came from the government saying they were going to fix Hummingbird Creek, which we thought was absolutely spectacular because we’ve had, I don’t know how many more government reports done since last June, and every one of those reports – that we’ve been able to get our hands on – have said get that creek fixed, and get it fixed now.” B.C. Ministry of Transportation spokesperson Kate Trotter confirmed in an email that work will soon begin on the creek. “Work at Hummingbird Creek is being organized right now, and will be completed before spring freshet,” writes Trotter. In addition, a 90-minute public meeting is being held on Wednesday, Feb. 13, 7 p.m. at the Swansea Point Community Hall, during which details of the work will be discussed. On June 23, 2012, residents of the small community were forced to evacuate when a flash flood occurred along Hummingbird Creek. Boulders, trees and other heavy debris caught in the flow blocked a culvert going under Highway 97A, causing the channel to divert. A torrent of water and debris moved over the highway and down along Swansea Road, and elsewhere in the community, causing substantial damage to roads, vehicles, homes and everything in its path. The neigh-
Up the creek: Tina and Dan Keely stand at an upper portion of Hummingbird Creek. As temperatures rise, the debris-filled channel is a growing concern for the Keelys and other Swansea Point residents, who are anxious not to see the it flood again. The province says work to reconstruct the creek will begin soon. Photo by Lachlan Labere bouring Hummingbird Beach Resort was ing, ‘I want to be paid to do your work,’” also impacted by the flash flood. laughed Schurek, while standing beside a Residents of 2 Mile, in the District of large portion of her property that is now Sicamous, were evacuated at the same time boulder-filled creek bed. as those in Swansea Point, as a similar flash Schurek adds that, as a result of the floodflood and debris flow was happening along ing, the creek is now significantly higher, Sicamous Creek. making the culvert The creek and less effective – a point highway in 2 Mile she and the Keelys have since been reare well aware of paired. In Swangiven the recent warm We are cautiously optimistic sea Point, however, weather. because we’ve had this promise residents have been “All of these flows given to us so many times growing increasingly or debris events, the before. anxious. Though the earliest we’ve had section of 97A damTina Keely on record is June aged by the flash 23,” says Tina. “But Swansea Point resident flood and the culvert every year it gets beneath were quickly warmer and, as clirestored, the channel mate change goes on, itself remains full of debris. And with the our freshets get earlier, and we can’t afford a culvert as it was prior to the flooding, Lois freshet at all unless something is done on the Schurek, who lives along the creek, is hop- creek. Because there are no banks in parts of ing for quick action from the province. She the creek, and people’s wells are sitting in the says if the government doesn’t do something creek or on the edge… so we have to get this soon, she will. damage repaired.” “If they don’t come and un-dam it by the Tina says all the attention Swansea Point time it gets to four feet, I’m going to be say- is now receiving from the province, as well
as Corrigan’s visit, is owed to residents, fulltime and seasonal, who have been expressing their concerns and complaints to MLAs in their respective home communities. “We started blitzing the government because we’d just had it,” says Tina. “As it turned out, everybody went home after the summer was over, and because our people who live here live all over the province and Alberta, they started blitzing their own MLAs wherever they lived, to tell them about all the damage done here and no one was fixing anything,” Tina explained. Corrigan confirmed her visit was prompted by letters from Swansea Point residents/ property owners including the Keely’s and Hummingbird Beach Resort president Steele Jordan. “It was because they were so concerned the window of opportunity is going to close fairly quickly and if work isn’t done, it will be too late,” explained Corrigan in an EVN interview. After touring Swansea Point and seeing the work that needs to be done, Corrigan says she is convinced Hummingbird Creek is a safety concern, which she plans to raise in See NDP critic on page 2