We need to hold fuel industry's feet to the fire
Two are gas stations at Kipling Avenue north of Rexdale Boulevard and Evans Avenue by Sherway Gardens. The bigger one, City Auto and Tire Service, is on Martin Grove Road, north of Rexdale Boulevard and is said to be double the fuel capacity of Sunrise Propane.
Though much effort is being made by the city, province and the fire marshal's office to reactively figure out what happened to cause the Sunrise explosion, this is also the time to proactively figure out how to prevent similar catastrophes here in Etobicoke and at other fuel storage facilities across the province.
The answer to that lies partly in a thorough review of provincewide fuel storage regulation, currently handled by the Technical Standards and Safety Authority (TSSA), a private, non-profit regulatory body.
In the weeks following the blast, the TSSA has come under fire for its disorganization and slack in releasing an out-of-date inventory list of fuel storage facilities, its delay in producing Sunrise inspection reports and its practice of inspecting those facilities only once every three years.
The latest inspection records for the Etobicoke facilities, released to The Guardian this week, are dated several years apart and list a handful of "deficiencies" each - the seriousness of which were unknown prior to Guardian deadline.
Where public safety is concerned, the accountability of those tasked to keep us safe is crucial, as is the transparency of inspection work. The former Conservative government divested itself of direct responsibility for fuel storage in 1996 but maybe it's time to reinstate that control.
Ontario Safety League President Brian Patterson would like to see industry self-regulation come to an end and Mayor David Miller said it should be considered. On Monday, while touring two of the Etobicoke fuel storage facilities, Ward 2 (Etobicoke North) Councillor Rob Ford also said he'd like the city to play a bigger role in the regulation of these sites.
Residents living near these areas need to be assured that those charged with inspecting fuel storage facilities are doing their due diligence in keeping our communities safe. The industry needs oversight and, where non-compliance is an issue, we need the power to hold its members' feet to the fire.
