About SWANA Pacific Chapter - BC & Yukon

Executive Director

The SWANA Pacific Chapter has a contracted Executive Director who provides the chapter with administrative and planning support as well as serving as a first line of contact for any enquiries. The Executive Director is not a member of the Board.

Questions about SWANA Pacific Chapter can be directed to the Executive Director via our contact page or [email protected].

Executive Committee 2024

SWANA Directors 2024

New Board Members

Farbod Diba

Since 2014, Farbod has been an active member of the SWANA Pacific Chapter. A current YP and training committee member, he has participated in SWANA Pacific’s initiatives and activities and shared his expertise in organic waste and household hazardous waste management. As a former YP chair, he led and organized events and activities for young professionals and after conference events. Farbod has more than 10 years of engineering experience in both public and private sectors of solid waste management industry, currently with the City of Vancouver. In his spare time he enjoys playing tennis

Mark Kurschner

Mark was born in Montreal, grew up in Ontario, where he earned his B.Sc. from University of Toronto, and then migrated to the golden west, to attend law school at UBC. After 15 years practising as a corporate/commercial/securities lawyer in Vancouver, Mark took the opportunity to work as CEO/in-house counsel with a business association and then a not-for-profit organization.
Mark joined the recycling/waste management sector in 2002 as President/CEO of Product Care, continuing in that role until 2023. During that time Product Care grew from one extended producer responsibility (“EPR”) program in BC for paint/HHW, to managing EPR programs for a variety of product categories, across Canada and in the USA on behalf of its producer members and as program manager for other EPR organizations.

Mark is now “mostly retired”, staying connected with the world of recycling waste management as part-time Vice-President of Legal/Government Relations with Product Care Association of Canada, and now with more time for cycling, visiting the cabin on Vancouver Island, becoming fluent in French, and travelling.

Executive

Karen Storry – President

Karen is a Senior Engineer for Metro Vancouver Solid Waste services. After graduating from Civil Engineering at UBC, she worked on the construction of the Canada Line before transitioning to solid waste planning at Metro Vancouver. Karen has been a member of the region’s Zero Waste Implementation Team for over 10 years. In that role, Karen has worked on a variety of waste reduction and prevention programs and policies. Her focus is on circular economy and the 3Rs.

In her spare time, Karen is completing her MBA in the Circular Economy from Bradford University. She also volunteers as her local chapter’s International Advisory Board Member for the Solid Waste Association of North America.

Before joining SWANA, she ran a public solid waste agency with a landfill and transfer station; worked as a consultant and as a local government recycling coordinator. After 10 years on the Board of Directors, she served as SWANA’s International President in 2011 at which time she helped organize the first steps in the Young Professionals Initiative.

Deacon Liddy – Treasurer

Deacon Liddy is a Professional Engineer working in the civil and environmental engineering industry. Leader in solid waste management facilities and systems, First Nations infrastructure, and greenhouse gas assurance/consulting.

He has been with GHD for over 16 years.

In his free time, he likes to grow grapes in the Similkameen Valley.

Directors

Mircea Cvaci – Marketing & Membership Committee Chair

Mircea L. Cvaci, P.Eng., MBA, is the Vice President and Senior Civil Engineer with Sperling Hansen Associates and the co-founder and Director of Business Development of DroneX Survey Inc. He is a BCIT lecturer for the Landfill Design Course and builds on his passion for sharing knowledge and giving back to the community. He has over 15 years of experience in solid and liquid waste management

He has been an active member of the SWANA Pacific Chapter since early 2009.

Heidi Gerlach

Heidi Gerlach is a solid waste management specialist with extensive experience in municipal and regional solid waste planning and contract management in British Columbia. Her expertise includes stakeholder and community consultation, program evaluation and waste management policy analysis. She has over 20 years’ solid waste program management experience, 15 of those as a staff member with BC local governments (City of Chilliwack and Fraser Valley Regional District).

As a Project Manager at Dillon Consulting, Heidi oversees multiple waste diversion/recycling remediation projects in the Metro Vancouver region and throughout BC and Canada.  Her team develops strategic framework, vision and targets for zero waste strategies and a circular economy.

In her free time, Heidi takes her dog for trail walks and wonders if she can put her empty toothpaste tube in the flexible plastic packaging bag.

Paul Henderson

Paul Henderson is a Professional Engineer with more than 30 years’ experience in the municipal sector.

As the General Manager of the Metro Vancouver Solid Waste Services Department, Paul leads the team responsible for waste reduction and recycling as well as residuals management for Metro Vancouver’s approximately 2.5 million people.

He has a degree in Bio Resource Engineering, a Masters of Applied Science in Civil Engineering from the University of British Columbia and a Masters of Business Administration from Simon Fraser University.

Scott Hoekstra, Operations & Regulatory Chair

Mr. Hoekstra is the Manager of Landfill and Compost Operations at the City of Kelowna and oversees the Glenmore Landfill and Regional Composting Facility. Mr. Hoekstra is a Professional Chemist and MOLO Certified, and has been involved in the British Columbia environmental industry for more than 25 years. After starting a career with Environmental Laboratories, he worked with HAZCO (later known as Tervita) on sites including large contaminated sites remediation projects, Industrial Oil Sands Landfills in Alberta, hazardous waste facilities, privately owned Construction and Demolition Debris landfills, and municipally owned Sanitary Landfills in British Columbia. In addition to being a Director with the SWANA Pacific Chapter, Mr. Hoekstra is the Past President and Board Member for the Association of Chemical Profession of British Columbia.

When not working, he spends time skiing with his daughters and enjoys golfing.

Calvin Jameson

Calvin Jameson is from Lil’wat Nation (Mount Currie) but originally hails from the Vernon, BC area. Calvin is President of the Indigenous Zero Waste Technical Advisory Group (IZWTAG) and the first Indigenous Zero Waste Operations trainer.

When he’s not in the office or in the field, he and his wife Jaclyn are parents to 3 boys and 3 foster daughters. He’s a part time coach to 2 of his boys’ ice hockey teams in Whistler (WMHA).  His goal is to use his skills, knowledge and experience to improve the water and solid waste systems for all nations.

Kevin Johnstone – Safety Ambassador

Kevin Johnstone has been involved with SWANA for 7 years, first as a student member then as a YP and also the YP committee head. He has been working as an Environmental Engineering Technologist for Ecowaste Industries for 4 years. He became involved with SWANA after connecting with some members at a networking session after a conference. Those connections helped Kevin complete his undergraduate thesis at BCIT, graduate, and find his first job in the industry doing waste audits.

Kevin values SWANA as an organization that allows him to continue to make new connections, learn about the industry, and participate in conferences. He looking forward to serving the SWANA BC/Yukon chapter throughout his career in solid waste.

Allen Lynch

Al worked in the solid waste industry for 30 years, 7 for private haulers and the last 23 as the Manager of the North Shore Recycling Program (NSRP), a tri-municipal agency in North Vancouver, B.C. Canada. Al was the Manager of the NSRP from 1990 to 2013 and was responsible for planning and administering all waste reduction, composting and recycling programs. Al represented the municipalities on various regional government committees and producer responsibility groups and made many presentations on a variety of subjects at national and regional conferences, including WASTECON. In addition he sat on the Board of Directors for the National Zero Waste Council.

Al has been a member of SWANA since 1990. He served on the SWANA International Board (IB) from 1995 to 2005, was International President of SWANA in 2004, and was the Canadian Representative to the IB from 2011-2014 and again from 2017-2019. He is currently a member of SWANA International’s Recycling Task Force and has served all of the roles on the Executive of the Pacific Chapter.

Andrew Marr

Bo Ocampo

Bo Ocampo is an Environmental Sustainability Specialist with the District of North Vancouver’s Climate and Biodiversity Team where she works to advance the municipality’s zero waste and circular economy initiatives. She has over ten years experience in waste reduction planning, policy, and education and outreach in both the private and public sector. She is motivated by finding ways to encourage sustainable behaviour and has an album on her phone filled with pictures of streetscape waste containers that she considers art.

Nicole Steglich – Training Committee Chair

Nicole Steglich is a Professional Engineer with over 14 years of experience in the solid waste industry. The majority of her experience was gained with the City of Vancouver’s Transfer & Landfill Operations Branch, where Nicole managed environmental projects and programs to ensure compliance with applicable regulations. In 2020, Nicole took a temporary role with the District of Squamish as the Integrated Solid Waste Specialist to gain experience managing curbside collection and zero waste programs. Nicole currently works for Metro Vancouver as a Senior Project Engineer.

Outside of the office, Nicole enjoys practicing yoga, spending time in the beautiful outdoors with friends and family, and trying new recipes.

Ben Routledge

Ben has worked for the Regional District of Nanaimo’s Solid Waste Services Department for more than 13 years. In that time, he has been responsible for the daily operation of the Regional Landfill and the Church Road Transfer Station, as well as managing the district wide Curbside Collection Program. In March 2022 he became the Manager, Solid Waste Services for the RDN. He is currently enrolled at Royal Roads University in the Master of Environmental Practice program, with program completion planned for March 2023. He is also a certified Manager of Landfill Operations.

Mike Stringer – Scholarship Committee Chair

Mike worked in the solid waste department of Metro Vancouver (formerly GVRD) between 1989 and 2012 following 5 years with the provincial Ministry of Environment and 15 years in private industry with Kodak Canada.  His work in solid waste included regulation development and administration and liaison with municipal, provincial and federal agencies and the private sector.

Mike has been an active SWANA member since 1990 serving as a director at large for most of the time.  He helped to establish and continues to administer the chapter scholarship program and currently is the chair of SWANA’s international scholarship committee.

Tauseef Waraich

Tauseef Waraich has over twenty years of experience in the waste management industry, working in both private sector and public office.  He has developed, implemented and administered long range master plans, including Solid Waste Management plans, Zero Waste Initiative and sustainable asset management plans.  He has managed efficient regional transfer stations, recycling centres and composting facilities. As a consultant, he has worked with many municipalities and regional districts throughout BC and Alberta providing services in Recycling and Waste Management planning, Priority based budgeting, Zero Waste, Contaminated Sites, landfills management, monitoring and sampling, auditing, and Risk Assessment.  Tauseef plays Cricket and enjoys outdoor activities including exploring different cultures and languages.

Wilbert Yang

Wilbert Yang is an environmental engineer with 30 years of experience in the environmental and waste management field.  His experience can be summarized in the following manner:

• As a regulator, he assessed waste discharges and developed regulations and guidelines for the waste management industry.
• As a municipal planning engineer, he developed waste diversion programs and worked with cities to implement and improve those programs.
• As a consultant, he works with cities across North America developing solid waste master plans, implementing organic waste management programs and benchmarking solid waste management systems.

Wilbert loves solid waste planning because it influences the way we live – hopefully for the better. He also recognizes that in the world of solid waste management “one size does not fit all” and the best system is one that suit the community’s values and ultimately something that its members would use”.