News Release - December 16, 2014

VANCOUVER – The BC government’s just-announced decision to build the Site C dam on the Peace River near Fort Saint John will go down as the most expensive mistake in BC’s history, says the Wilderness Committee.

The Site C dam is strongly opposed by Peace Valley landowners and First Nations, as well as downstream First Nations in Alberta – all of whom have recently launched court challenges opposing the dam. Opposition to Site C is widespread, and encompasses both business and environmental concerns.

“The Site C dam project is so damaging to the environment and wasteful of taxpayers funds that it’s beyond me how any government could come out in favour of building it – but they have,” said Joe Foy, the Wilderness Committee’s National Campaign Director.

“The human rights impacts associated with the project – particularly to First Nations communities – are egregious and shameful,” Foy said.

The Site C dam would eliminate thousands of hectares of farmland and drown over 100 kilometres of critical valley-bottom wildlife habitat, as well as First Nations cultural sites.

It would also balloon BC’s provincial debt to levels that could threaten the province’s credit rating. In the past week alone, the price tag for the controversial project has dramatically increased from an estimated $7.9 billion to $8.775 billion.

“In the coming weeks and months, we will be working with our allies to support the court challenges aimed at stopping the Site C dam. It’s a crying shame it had to come to this, but we have to stop this dam project before it drowns us all in debt and conflict,” said Foy.

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For more information, please contact:

Joe Foy, National Campaign Director, Wilderness Committee
604-683-8220 (office), 604-880-2580 (cell)

Photo: Peace River Valley (Tuchodi via Flickr)