Dear Editor:
I live in North Burnaby, and we see bears (and other wildlife) on the trails around our house every year, without fail. We feel lucky to live in a place with so much wildlife.
However, since Burnaby changed garbage pickup to city-provided bins, we have had a problem. The bins are not animal proof. When contacted on this issue, the sanitation department's line was clear; it's our problem. We are told to store the bins "securely."
We can modify the bins, but if the city doesn't like the modification, they will charge us for a new bin. We cannot buy a third-party bear-proof bin, like the ones used in Whistler, Squamish or Revelstoke (bear-aware cities) because they will refuse to pick them up.
This leaves me and my neighbours in a bind. We have two bears knocking over garbage bins every night this week. We want to do the right thing, but because of how the properties are laid out it is impossible to store the bins securely unless I keep them inside the front door. We would gladly buy bear-proof bins, but there is no option to do so. Bears habituated to garbage are routinely killed as they become used to human interaction, and this inevitably leads to aggressive incidents.
City of Burnaby: please give your citizens the tools or the options to help us reduce the chance of bears being killed in the city of Burnaby. Either provide us with a bear-proof bin, or let us buy one. You are blaming the citizens for a situation you've created.
Michael Coyle, Burnaby
