If you need a toilet in Port Edward, the district has 35 of them sitting in the basement and it is giving them away for free.
The small community just south of Prince Rupert in northwest British Columbia said the low-flush toilets will go to residents on a first-come, first-served basis.
The toilets are leftover stock from a water conservation initiative in 2003 and have been sitting in the Port Edward district office basement for the past two decades.
“They’re taking up a lot of space down in our basement,” said Tyson Schofield, the district’s chief administrative officer. “I thought, ‘This is not a good use of these toilets. Let’s get them out for their intended purpose and let’s get them out to the residents what they were used for.'”
Schofield started the job in June after moving from the City of Delta. Port Edward had 470 residents in the 2021 census.
He said he found the 35 toilets collecting dust in the office basement and decided to restart the program and hand them out for free.
On Thursday, Aug. 27, the district announced on social media that it would give away free water-reduction toilets using an image of Oprah Winfrey and the words, “You get a toilet! You get a toilet! You get a toilet!”
By the next day, 18 toilets had already been claimed.
Port Edward resident Teresa Andrews went to the district office to pick up a free toilet for herself and for her sons’ houses.
“It’s a great thing for them to do for us,” she said. “It means that we’re upgrading our toilet without having to go to the hardware store and buy one.”
Schofield said he looked into the original 2003 program and found the district had been reconstructing its water treatment plant at the time. He said the community had to lower its water use to get grant money for the project.
“From conversation with the community back then, it came up that we could install some low-flush toilets, so that’s why they were purchased,” he said.
Schofield said the toilets are more than 20 years old and he cannot guarantee their quality, but the district recently installed two of them in its office and they have been working well.
“They might not be the perfect toilet,” he said. “However, it’s always good to reduce the use of water.”
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