Squamish Mayor frustrated with garbage being left by visitors

Squamish Mayor Patricia Heintzman wants visitors to respect the region, or not come at all.

The comments came during an interview on Mountain Mornings on Tuesday regarding garbage and sometimes human waste that is left by users of trails and park areas within the region. The Mayor said this year seemed to be particularly bad when it comes to garbage left behind by visitors; “we wanna invite visitors, we want them to come and enjoy, but they need to respect our people, they need to respect our environment, they need to respect the wildlife, and if they’re going to come up here and do that kind of thing I’d rather they not come up here”.

Heintzman says she’s being brutally honest, but that we shouldn’t have to tell people not to leave garbage in the woods. She suggests more education should take place in cities, as well as more patrols. Recently Squamish added two new part time bylaw officers to the bylaw department, but many instances occur on crown land where the province patrols and is outside of the District of Squamish’s jurisdiction.

The Mayor’s comments follow 333.4lbs of garbage that was removed from Brohm Lake by volunteer divers in June, over 100lbs that was taken out of Cat Lake by the same group – Divers for Cleaner Lakes and Oceans in May and over 40lbs of garbage that was collected by Whistler residents on a hike to Joffree Lakes.

“I wouldn’t go and leave garbage in their back yard, they can’t leave it here” said Heintzman.

You can listen to the Mayor’s full interview on Mountain Mornings here.