Prince George City Council has decided to wait and see on costs when it comes to recommendations made by the City’s Advisory Committee on Bear Awareness.
Council was presented with eight recommendations at last night’s (Monday) meeting on a number of bear-related actions.
These included establishing a new city staff position focused on achieving Provincial Bear Smart Status and committing financial support for the position for five years, establishing a new Bear Aware Technical Committee, and establish a new pilot project for bear resistant garbage bins.
The Committee’s report with the full recommendations is here.
The Advisory Committee’s Chair and Northern Bear Awareness Society Treasurer Lisa Cran said establishing the City position to help achieve Provincial Bear Smart Status is the first step.
“That one is very critical and has an effect on some of the other recommendations,” she noted.
“Otherwise, the waste management is the number one bear conflict issue.”
While many of the recommendations have financial impacts, the report does not come with a dollar figure for the recommendations.
“The recommendations are quite wide-ranging and they involve several city departments, and some have serious financial implications on the city’s budget for several years moving forward,” said City Manager Walter Babicz.
Babicz recommended that Council refer the recommendations to City Administration for staff review, with a report to be returned to City Council at a later date.
“I think the referral’s the proper thing to do,” said Councillor Brian Skakun.
“There’s a number of different things that I think we don’t know much about, perhaps the committee knows more about it.”
When asked about timelines, Babicz said the review was starting today (Tuesday), but didn’t say when a report could be expected.
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