Kamloops councillor calling for provincial review of existing rules around public toilets

KAMLOOPS — A Kamloops Councillor is spearheading a push to try and ensure there are adequate public toilets for residents and visitors in communities across British Columbia.

Councillors voted 7-2 in favour of Nancy Bepple’s notice of motion to ask the Provincial Government to review the Public Health Act, as she said that the lack of available public washrooms is concerning.

“I’ve had some of my colleagues say that they can leave their house at the beginning of the day and not have to worry about where there might be a toilet, but its challenging for people with little children,” Bepple said. “I have a friend who can no longer go shopping because there are just no public toilets available, so its a really burden for him.

“I went on a small road trip and stopped in a town with one gas station and the sign said ‘toilet permanently closed.’ There were no other services available in that town, so what was I supposed to do?”

Speaking at Tuesday’s (Feb. 4) council meeting, Bepple said she believes there are “viable solutions” that the Province can work towards in consultation with residents, businesses, local governments, and health authorities.

“This is not an issue that we need to deal with,” Bepple added. “This is provincial legislation and it should be the responsibility of the provincial government to see how can we make things better because it has gotten much worse in the last few years.”

Concerns about vandalism and drug use

While councillors voted to advance the motion to the next Southern Interior Local Government Association (SILGA) convention, there were some concerns raised around vandalism, drug use, and potential downloaded costs onto municipalities and business owners.

“I get the intent [of the motion] but the unintended consequences are more worrisome to me,” Councillor Mike O’Reilly said. “It’s easy to say that we need a bathroom and to have that accessibility but as has been mentioned, the world has changed. We’re making it harder and harder for businesses to be able to function.

“I think people’s patterns have to change a little bit, and I do think businesses that have to have [washrooms] open to the public through health authority should be open, but as Councillor [Kelly] Hall said, I fear the province will come back and it’ll be pushed back on municipalities making it more expensive for us.”

O’Reilly and Mayor Reid Hamer-Jackson, who shared similar concerns, voted in opposition to Bepple’s motion.

“I have a business on a street and I’ve let lots of people use my bathroom and you don’t know how many times its been backed up and they lock themselves in there,” Hamer-Jackson said. “I have no problem if I go into a restaurant or if I go to a gas station but how do you tell a business that they’ve got to let specific people in after they’ve damaged or vandalized the bathrooms over and over and over again?

“I also think we need to go to the root cause. A lot of it is to do with addictions and metal health. Regular people that are walking into the washroom don’t back toilets up and come in and burn them and beat them up.”

Bepple: doing nothing is ‘not an option’

While Bepple said she agrees that costs shouldn’t be downloaded, she also said she felt not doing anything wasn’t an option either.

“You don’t want to download onto municipalities and businesses but that doesn’t change the fact that there is a problem,” Bepple said. “To say that its ‘worse than it was but we’re okay with it and that’s just the way its going to be,’ I’m not good with that.”

“I think the province has put this legislation in place and they need to do some consultation to find out how to make it work better because I don’t want it to get worse.”

If Bepple’s motion is adopted by delegates at the SILGA convention, it will proceed to the Union of British Columbia Municipalities (UBCM) convention in September.

“If it passes, then it means that the UBCM would be lobbying the government for the changes,” Bepple told CFJC Today. “In terms of my bringing it forward, it wasn’t simply because of issues in Kamloops. Its happening in many places in B.C. for various reasons. I can appreciate why we’re losing toilet facilities but it impacts people.”