BWA

Drinking Water Committee Presents

BOIL WATER ADVISORIES

What are they and how do we deal with them?

Today's date

0.5 CEUs will be available for this event.

June 15th 2007

Best Western Hotel, Richmond BC

Thank you to all those who came and participated in the Boil Water Advisory Seminar. The presentations from the seminar are available for download below (PDF format).

Please note, these presentations are provided for information purposes only and should not be reproduced without written permission from the authors.

Barry Boettger - The Drinking Water Protection Act (116 kB)

Dr. Patricia Daly - BWA, Greater Vancouver 2006 (3.4 MB)

Tom Heath & Bob Jones - The GVRD Experience (589 kB)

Len Clarkson - BWA, An Effective Public Health Tool (220 kB)

Dr. James Lu - Water Quality Advisory, Why Don't You Just Tell Me to Boil the Water? (749 kB)

Join us for this workshop in the Lower Mainland where you will hear the legal framework around Boil Water Advisories (BWAs), why they are issued and lifted and how to interpret them. You will also get to hear about the events and decisions that led to the November 2006 BWA in the GVRD, lessons learned and how to plan for the future.

After all the presentations the speakers will form a panel ready for a question and answer session. The result of this will be the development of a framework and prioritization of the outputs into a discussion paper for distribution.

Who will benefit most from this event?

Health Authorities	Local Politicians
Municipal Employees	Food Industry Representatives
GVRD	Policy Makers – Emergency Preparedness
The General Public	Public Affairs/Communication Professionals
Consulting Engineers	The Media

Goals/Objectives

Increase awareness and share experiences that sensitize the public re: Boil Water Advisories (BWAs)
Better equip those who need to know with information on how to deal with BWAs from a policy, decision making and emergency preparation perspective

PROGRAMME FOR THE DAY
TIME	SPEAKERS	TOPIC	LEARNING OBJECTIVES
Morning	REGISTRATION
	Barry Boettger Ministry of Health	What exactly are Drinking Water Advisories/Orders? - General Legal Framework, DWO guide, Drinking Water Protection Act	Understanding the legislative framework behind advisories Understanding the public health policy considerations behind advisory and notification programs Recognizing the importance of complying with advisory requests or orders and associated notification requirements
	REFRESHMENT BREAK
	Dr. Patricia Daly Vancouver Coastal Health	Keynote Speaker – Regulation, Health, Human Dynamics	To review the events and decisions that led to the boil water advisory in the GVRD in November 2006. To understand the lessons learned from this event. To use these lessons to plan for future boil water advisories in any watershed.
	Tom Heath & Bob Jones Greater Vancouver Regional District	Experiences from 2006 Events - Key issues – procedures, communication, etc	Planning ahead for a drinking water crisis – a utility perspective. Obtaining and distributing important information for decision-making. Communicating with the public and other stakeholders.
Afternoon	LUNCH
	Len Clarkson Vancouver Coastal Health	Boil Water Advisories for Rural Water Systems	Understanding reasons for issuing advisories Understanding reasons for lifting advisories How to interpret meaning/category
	Dr. James Lu Vancouver Coastal Health	In this presentation, Dr Lu will provide a medical health office' s perspective of how the drinking water turbidity problem was dealt with in Kamloops during the years leading up to the completion of the filtration plant.	To learn about how Public Health managed drinking water turbidity in Kamloops in the years leading up to the filtration plant To understand some of the challenges facing Public Health decision makers in an imperfect world
	REFRESHMENT BREAK
	Panel Discussion Q & A	“How do you keep the public informed?”	The Drinking Water Committee will prioritize the outputs of this session into framework and develop a discussion paper for broader distribution

PANEL DISCUSSION SESSION MODERATOR

B. Neal Carley, M.A.Sc., P.Eng.

Manager of Waterworks Design

City of Vancouver

After receiving his Master’s of Applied Science Degree from the University of British Columbia in 1988, Neal started his career at the Greater Vancouver Regional District. In 1994, Neal moved to the private sector as consultant, spending close to 10 years as President of Carley Environmental Inc. and almost three years with Kerr Wood Leidal as a section leader. In late 2006, Neal joined the City of Vancouver as the Manager of Waterworks Design.

Neal also served in leadership roles on a number of organizations including the BC Water & Waste Association (President 1998-99), Recycling Council of British Columbia (President 1998-99), Water Environment Federation (Director, 2000-03), Waste Management Association of BC (Treasurer), BC Chapter of SWANA (Director), Blueridge Parent Advisory Council (President, 2005-06), Municipal Administrators’ Training Institute (Faculty for the MATI-2 Leadership Course), BC Hydro Community Liaison Committee (Chair), BC Hydro Water and Wastewater Centre of Excellent (Adisory Board), Association of Professional Engineers and Geoscientists of BC (Editorial Board, Environment Committee), and as a Scouts leader since 2001.

KEYNOTE SPEAKER

Dr. Patricia Daly MD, FRCPC Medical Health Officer and Medical Director of Communicable Disease Control Vancouver Coastal Health.

Dr. Daly is a Medical Health Officer and the Medical Director of Communicable Disease Control for Vancouver Coastal Health in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada and is a Clinical Associate Professor in the Department of Health Care and Epidemiology at the University of British Columbia. She is responsible for the surveillance, prevention and control of communicable diseases in Vancouver Coastal Health, including the implementation of immunization programmes and the investigation and control of outbreaks. Dr. Daly obtained her medical degree from the University of Toronto in 1985 and obtained a fellowship in Community Medicine from the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada in 1992.

Barry Boettger Provincial Drinking Water Officer, Office of the Provincial Health Officer Ministry of Health.

Barry Boettger has been involved in the Ministry of Health's drinking water program since 1993. between 2000 and 2003 he was part of the team tasked with the development of the Drinking Water Protection Act and Regulation and, subsequently, the Drinking Water Officer Guide. Mr. Boettger represents British Columbia on the Federal/Provincial/Territorial Committee on Drinking Water which works with Health Canada to establish our National drinking water guidelines.

Tom Heath

Manager, Operations & Maintenance Greater Vancouver Regional District

Tom Heath is a professional engineer with over 30 years of experience with the GVRD in the provision of drinking water to the Region. He is currently manager of the GVRD’s Operations and Maintenance department

Bob Jones

Quality Control Division Manager of the Operations and Maintenance Department Greater Vancouver Regional District.

A native of BC, he has resided in the GVRD since 1972 after graduating with a B.Sc. degree in Chemistry from Gonzaga University in Spokane, Washington. He began his career with the GVRD in 1977. During his career with the GVRD, he has co-authored a paper comparing different water disinfectants in the GVRD. The paper was published in the Journal of the American Water Works Association. In addition, Mr. Jones has made numerous presentations on water quality control and related subjects at the British Columbia Water and Waste Association annual conference and at other venues.

Mr. Jones is a member and Past President (1999-2000) of the British Columbia Water and Waste Association and was the AWWA Director for the BC Section of AWWA from 2003-2006. He has also been a member of the Board of the Canadian Water and Wastewater Association since 2001, was CWWA President from 2004 to 2005. In addition, Mr. Jones was the first chair of the BCWWA Drinking Water Quality Committee and has been a member of the CWWA Drinking Water Quality Committee from 1995 – 2006.

Len Clarkson

Drinking Water Officer,Vancouver Coastal Health.

Len is an Environmental Health Officer with 30 years experience. With various past duties including Deputy Chief EHO and Water Quality Specialist, Len is now the lead DWO for rural water systems within VCH. Len is also a past member of the Drinking Water Leadership Council and maintains his involvement with the BCWWA Drinking Water Committee.

Dr. James Lu Medical Health Officer

Vancouver Coastal Health

Whether true or not, Dr James Lu was known in Kamloops as the Medical Health Officer that ordered the City to build a water filtration plant. Dr Lu has been a Medical Health Officer in BC for about 18 years. He spent most of his early public health career in the BC interior. He was the MHO for Kamloops 1995-2003. He is the MHO for Richmond, with Vancouver Coastal Health since 2003. He thought he was through with turbidity when he left Kamloops...until last November.