Metro Vancouver board votes to ship garbage to U.S.

The board of Metro Vancouver has voted for a plan to send the region's garbage to Washington state, if the provincial government authorizes the shipments.

For almost 20 years, the city's garbage has been sent to a dump in Cache Creek, near Kamloops.

But Metro Vancouver officials have been forced to seek alternatives because the Cache Creek landfill is expected to be full by 2010.

"We've been trying to get something going in the Interior for about almost a decade and it hasn't worked out, and the board finally said, 'Enough already, we're going to give up on the Interior and find other alternatives,'" said Metro Vancouver waste committee vice-chairman Peter Ladner.

Sending the garbage to Washington is a short-term solution, said Ladner. Eventually, the city hopes to burn the garbage to generate power.

The idea of shipping garbage to the U.S. has not been well received by Cache Creek residents, including Mayor John Ranta.

"From our perspective, waste represents jobs in the Interior," he said. 

"We've enjoyed the benefit of those jobs since 1989. The urgency surrounding the decision that's contemplated is not there, and we should be trying to protect jobs in British Columbia for British Columbians to the greatest extent possible."