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NEWS: Victoria set to become a blue community

The Victoria Times Colonist reports, “Victoria councillors have backed a motion by Councillor Marianne Alto designating the city a ‘blue community’ that supports publicly owned water supplies, bans bottled water at civic facilities and recognizes water as a basic human right.”

“The blue communities project is a join initiative of the Council of Canadians and the Canadian Union of Public Employees. The resolution, approved by the city’s governance and priorities committee, will have to be ratified by council next week.”

“The move was applauded by Bharat Chandramouli, of the Council of Canadians. ‘The blue community initiative is a great way for municipalities to reiterate their support for water as a human right, and to emphasize the public ownership of water,’ he said.”

“(Councillor Alto says), ‘It is recognition of the U.N.’s movement to provide international understanding about the utility of water as a human right and the fact that unlike most other resources it is something without which we can’t exist’.”

“Under the two-part resolution, Victoria is committed to lobbying the federal government ‘to fulfil its responsibility to support municipal infrastructure by investing in a national water infrastructure fund’ to renew existing water infrastructure and build new systems; and, promote the quality, safety and use of tap water.”

“Under the resolution the sale of bottle water would be prohibited at the city works yard, the parks yard, city hall and the Crystal Pool. …The ban won’t have any impact on operations of the Save-on-Foods Memorial Centre, which is run by a private contractor but could mean people booking events at the Victoria Convention Centre could be asked not to sell bottled water.”

The full article is at http://www.timescolonist.com/news/story.html?id=4967125.