“Go back to the drawing board!”

The unified message from a cabal of concerned citizens outraged over a proposal to address decaying, end-of-life infrastructure and build towards the future was loud and clear.

Audible guffaws, boos and hisses filled a lofty hall as consultants insisted that what was being presented was the only cost-effective and reasonable path forward. The solution, developed by engineers and industry experts, would address both the demand for growth and the current needs of municipal water users.

Of course, we are referring to a meeting held 20 years ago, on October 5th, 2005 at the Crystal Palace. Residents worried aloud about the potential costs, location and technology of a proposed $16-$18 million water pollution control and treatment plant.

Did you think we could be referring to anything else?

The date of that acrimonious meeting is easy to recall. After a nuclear winter work stoppage, the NHL was resuming play that night with a Battle of Ontario slated to open the season’s hockey schedule. This fact was not lost on meeting facilitator Deborah Ross, who opened the proceedings expressing the hope that things could be wrapped up before the end of the game.

Ms. Ross, the staff, and councillors knew what type of night they were in for when a heckler shot back that this matter was of far more importance than “some hockey game in Toronto.” For the record, the Leafs lost to the Senators in the NHL’s first ever shootout.

October 2005 is where the first salvos were fired in the long and meandering path to a Picton Wastewater Treatment plant that, five years later, cost its users over double the initial estimate.

There was a good reason for that meeting, and for the anger on display. A consultant had examined Picton’s Secondary Plan and concluded a water pollution control plant near the Waring’s Creek headwaters was a good idea. Mayor Leo Finnegan intervened to note there was no way a wastewater plant was going to be built behind Canadian Tire and No Frills.

Delhi Park was next on the list. But test footings revealed intact bags of garbage half a dozen feet below the surface. The former town landfill was right where we had left it.

That’s how Champlain’s Lookout emerged as the only real solution. Picton is the only town in Eastern Ontario that pumps wastewater uphill. But being unique is a good thing.

With a location in mind, Council was about to approve a traditional plant for $16-18 million. It was eligible for the Canada-Ontario-Municipal Rural Investment Fund (COMRIF). Two-thirds of the project was going to be covered by the province and the feds. There was a feeling that the County was getting a good deal.

But then came Lyle McBurney and Jim McPherson and the Concerned Citizens for Clean Water. They wanted green and low-cost wastewater treatment. They wanted what was called a “Living Machine.” A series of settling tanks would allow the roots of aquatic vegetation to slowly and methodically clean the wastewater until, at the final stage, it discharged drinkable aqua. Sound too good to be true?

While county staff had applied for and received COMRIF funding for the initial $16 million estimate on the wastewater plant, council decided it had to give the Living Machine advocates an opportunity to prove their case.

There was a fact-finding trip to Okotoks, Alberta to examine one of the few operational Living Machines in Canada. Engineers noted that it was connected to all new infrastructure. The pipes in Picton, even then, were decidedly not that.

Next, an environmental assessment  — we all know how fast and cheap those are — added another $1 million and another couple of years. It proved once and for all that the living machine was dead in the water.

For the record, Council had been ready to forge ahead with an $18 million, heavily subsidized plant. Add two years of delay, and the extra costs associated with pumping uphill, and that subsidy now covered only one third. Meanwhile, the deadline for further government funds had come and gone.

The County was now on the hook for twice what it had bargained for. The WWTP that finally opened cost $33 million, of which only one third, or $10.3 million, came from COMRIF.

So for those wondering how Picton ended up with a wastewater treatment plant that cost over double the initial estimate, that’s how. Concerned citizens who thought they knew best harangued council because they didn’t like the initial cost of the project, doubted what they heard from consultants, and thought they had a better idea. In the end, it cost County water users dearly.

Transparency and engagement are the bedrock of democracy. And so is trust. Trust in our elected representatives. Trust in the staff and consultants who do all the research for us. Trust in the public conversation. Trust in the process.