Image Credit: FILE PHOTO
January 17, 2017 - 4:42 PM
KAMLOOPS - Community benefit meetings have starting up again between the City of Kamloops and KGHM Ajax after a long hiatus.
The meetings, held to discuss how the relationship between the city and the company behind the propsed Ajax mine will work — including financial compensation — have resumed after a break since midway through last year.
Coun. Pat Wallace, who’s leading the city’s side of the meetings, says the first meeting of 2017 was held yesterday, Jan. 16, and it was congenial.
The meetings involve council’s industrial tax base committee, which includes Coun. Dieter Duty, who’s spoken against the potential mine and Coun. Ken Christian, who is replacing Mayor Peter Milobar on the committee this year.
While the meetings, like the environmental permitting process, have been on hold for some time, Wallace says they are looking to move briskly on the negotiations.
“We certainly have deadlines and we have to move quickly,” she says.
Future meeting dates haven’t been set yet. Wallace says details about what’s being discussed are not being released right now and the details are confidential.
The proposed Ajax Mine is currently going through the government’s environmental assessment process. The 180 day assessment was paused at day 108 for the mining company to collect more information and hasn’t yet been restarted. Public works director Jen Fretz says it’s unclear to the city when the assessment will be reopened.
For more on the proposed mine, click here.
To contact a reporter for this story, email Brendan Kergin or call 250-819-6089 or email the editor. You can also submit photos, videos or news tips to the newsroom and be entered to win a monthly prize draw.
We welcome your comments and opinions on our stories but play nice. We won't censor or delete comments unless they contain off-topic statements or links, unnecessary vulgarity, false facts, spam or obviously fake profiles. If you have any concerns about what you see in comments, email the editor in the link above.
News from © iNFOnews, 2017