Cat bylaw rejected
Sechelt councillors are following the advice of their bylaw department and will not go forward with a cat bylaw.
At their Jan. 17 meeting, councillors considered a report that ran to more than 60 pages, weighing the arguments for and against such a bylaw.
Mayor Bruce Milne, however, noted that he’s been on the record as being “at least open to a cat bylaw” for several years, and predicted that completely ignoring the municipality’s cats is not going to be possible in the long term because the district continues to get complaints.
“I feel fairly strongly that we should do something, and I don’t think we’ll stop the stream of letters that are coming in, and have been coming in, until we actually address it,” said Milne.
Phare Lake naming
The District of Sechelt is a step closer to making a formal application to have a lake near the site of the 2015 Old Sechelt Mine wildfire named “John Phare Lake.” Phare, a tree faller from Roberts Creek, lost his life fighting that fire.
The lake has no formal name, but until recently was known to most Sunshine Coasters as Wormy Lake. Having the lake named after Phare requires an exemption to the provincial rules for geographical features which do not allow them to be named after victims of “mishaps, accidents or tragedies” or to mark places where they occurred.
At the Jan. 17 meeting, councillors received a letter from the Sunshine Coast Regional District confirming it was ready to support a naming application and an exemption.
With that letter in hand, Sechelt can now file the application.
Community members have already put up a hand-carved sign at the lake, and Coun. Noel Muller said he hasn’t heard anyone in the community suggest the renaming shouldn’t go forward. “We’ve sent this forward and back, and I think now is the time to just go ahead and do it,” he said.
Pedals and Paddles TUP
Councillors have approved a temporary use permit for a well-known seasonal business in Sechelt Inlet.
Pedals and Paddles has been leasing the property in the Tuwanek area for the past five years. It was once used as a log sort and is currently owned by the development company Publico. Pedals and Paddles uses it to run a kayak rental and outfitting business.
The two-year permit will allow the company to have a storage compound, outhouses, an office building, storage sheds, and an RV for a staff/customer waiting room on site.
It also allows for a parking area and boat launch.
The permit conditions also require Pedals and Paddles to put up a $10,000 security bond guaranteeing the site will be decommissioned and cleaned to its natural state.
