A private utility that serves a B.C. ski resort has been fined nearly $120,000 for a series of wastewater treatment compliance issues that includes a history of failing to employ qualified operators.
B.C.’s Natural Resource Compliance and Enforcement Database flagged several issues in an administrative penalty report covering Hemlock Utility Services Ltd.’s management of the resort’s wastewater treatment facility. Those issues cover a lack of certification, monitoring and reporting from Sasquatch Mountain Resort near Chilliwack, B.C., which has expansion plans in the works to become one of the largest resorts in the province.
The largest of the utility’s four penalties relates to it not being operated and maintained by a chief operator certified by the Environmental Operators Certification Program (EOCP) for a facility classified as WWT III.
The utility had also been found out of compliance for the staffing certification issue in 2022 and 2023, a time when the wastewater facility still had not been classified as required by the EOCP. It was also fined for staffing certification issues in 2024.
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In response to staff training, the utility told B.C. officials that its manager is currently enrolled in the EOCP program and expected to be wastewater Level 1 certified by December 2025.
“The intention is to then proceed with further levels as required. This is part of our broader effort to ensure compliance and demonstrate that we are working on changing for the better,” Hemlock Utility Services wrote to the ministry in a submission for the penalty report.
The B.C. Ministry of Environment was not moved by the submission, however, and highlighted the fact that the ski resort’s system is a Level III facility, “which denotes a larger size and complexity,” the penalty report states, meaning that facility staffing would still be out of compliance for some time until that higher level of certification is attained.
“Failure to comply with the operator certification operational requirement created, at a minimum, a risk of harm to the environment or human health and safety,” wrote Kelly Mills, director of the Environmental Management Act.
Over the course of 2023 and 2024, the utility also failed to monitor effluent for several contaminants — including fecal coliform bacteria — before discharging it into a creek that flows into a waterway known to support coho salmon, rainbow trout and steelhead. That contravention was found to have been repeated seven times.
The utility was also penalized for failing to install and maintain a flow meter, record monthly samples of effluent and submit records to the province.
