Editor:
It is 10 years since Joe Harrison and I began a campaign to have a new national marine park created in Jervis Inlet and a portion of Squamish Indian Band territory.
The roughly 3,500-sq.-kilometre area is presently being logged and there is a real danger that the priceless ancient forests, the habitat of many bird and animal species, will be lost unless immediate action is taken to preserve them and the marine areas they surround. Our group, the Friends of Caren, worked hard in the ’90s to save and preserve Spipiyus Provincial Park in which we found the threatened marbled murrelet breeding among a number of other species including the Barrow’s goldeneye.
We proved that these forests were Canada’s oldest closed canopy forests by finding yellow cedars over 1,858 years old. A cross section of one of these trees can be seen in the Iris Griffith Interpretive Centre, close to Ruby Lake on Highway 101.
Shíshálh elders in 2010 gave this campaign their blessings and supported our efforts to get this area preserved in perpetuity as a national marine park providing we saved their sacred spaces, yet we still need to convince Ottawa to preserve this area despite Canada’s commitment in 2010 in Oji, Japan to set aside marine waters and lands.
Now we need concerted pressure on Ottawa to make this happen with help and assistance from Nature BC, Nature Vancouver and our local groups, the Sunshine Coast Conservation Association and the Pender Harbour Wildlife Society.
It seems to be a no-brainer to me when we consider climate change and preserving ancient tree-cover which is the preservation of natural ecosystems that have come to us unchanged since the last ice age.
The COVID pandemic has only made it more necessary to save our backyard before it is lost for all time. The incredible Princess Louisa Inlet is at the very heart of this. Yet we need to convince Ottawa and the shíshálh and Squamish nations that a new national park should become a reality.
Please write to Ottawa and press them into action.
Paul Jones and Friends of Caren, Garden Bay
