Less than two weeks after a family of three bears was killed in Port Moody, city bylaw officers made a grim find: a neighbourhood where nearly 100 garbage bins had been put out the night before collection day.
Now, PoMo's bylaw staff are hoping a stepped-up enforcement campaign will help drive home the message.
They kicked off the blitz at 4:30 a.m. Monday in Glenayre, where out of about 500 homes, nearly 90 carts were out on the street, flouting the bylaw stipulating carts must be put out between 5:30 and 7:30 a.m. on collection day.
Officers will be mailing 83 warnings and five second-offence tickets (a first offence comes with a warning, followed by increasing fines of $50 for a second offence, $100 and $150), and posted a photo of a garbage bin that had already been looted by animals.
"We will be continuing random patrols in various neighbourhoods in the coming weeks to ensure that everyone is doing their part to reduce bear attractants," the caption read under the photo posted to Facebook.
Robyn MacLeod, PoMo's manager of building, bylaw and licensing, said staff typically begin regular patrols for proper waste cart storage in early March. Certain neighbourhoods are targeted for further enforcement, usually in the early spring and late fall, when wildlife activity is at its highest, based on information received from the BC Conservation Officer Service, Wildlife Alert Reporting Program and complaints received by the city.
And while the city uses several channels to educate residents about eliminating bear attractants — including an annual educational seminar, dedicated info on its solid waste app, a social media awareness campaign and instructions for managing bear attractants attached to the waste collection schedule that's distributed to every household and more — not all Port Moody residents are getting the message.
On April 14, a BC Conservation officer shot a sow and two yearlings in the Panorama Drive area of PoMo because they had been getting into residents' yards and garages to search for food.
The three were not good candidates for relocation because the mother had already been moved once but had returned in the fall to the residential area to get at easy food sources. Shortly after leaving their dens in early March, they were back at it.
Insp. Murray Smith said the bears had "no fear of people" and had to be killed to ensure people's safety, a move that conservation officers dread, he said.
The easiest solution, Smith noted, is to "lock up all the human food sources, the bird feed" as well as picking up fruit from trees in the fall and putting away pet food.
MacLeod echoed those instructions, saying, "We live in bear country. Managing access to garbage and other attractants is a community-wide responsibility and is the most important thing we can do to keep both people and bears safe in Port Moody."
spayne@tricitynews.com
@spayneTC
