Editor:
A lot of attention is devoted to the damage around the pier after the storm.
Luckily, nobody got hurt despite several people putting themselves in harm’s way, ignoring the powers of nature in their quest to get cool pictures.
Now there is a bill to pay, and if nothing else, using taxpayers’ money can get Canadians involved.
There is a lot of complaining about “our tax money” being wasted here or there.
Let me enlighten you. In order to live life in safe and first class conditions, we have to pay a lot more. The good thing is, we can afford it.
The price to repair the pier is supposed to run into the millions. We need it, or White Rock is just going to be another upscale shantytown on a body of water with no attractions other than a painted monolith and fish and chips shops. Imagine, however, if the owners of the boat mooring had decided “good” instead of “cheap,” when it was built.
If the jetty, with the boats still attached, had not broken loose, the pier would have survived the storm, but of course it is not built to withstand the ramming of stray sailboats.
On top of the structural damage, what about the millions of bits of Styrofoam from the cheap-solution jetty, glass fibre, toxic liquids, engine oils and fuel from the sailboats entering the bay?
My prediction is, that responsibility will be ignored. The ones cutting corners never end up footing the bill for their negligence. Donors and the city of White Rock will end up paying for this.
Let us go for a paradigm shift, and ask for “good” instead of “cheap.”
Act like you are going to be here forever, and not like colonials, going in, taking short-term gains and leaving devastation behind you when you move on in search of new opportunities.
Imagine if our forefathers’ desire to get rich on canning 100 years ago had not eradicated the abundance of salmon in the bay.
We could, to this day, have had a sustainable and regulated salmon population to be enjoyed by us all.
Ole Nygaard, White Rock