Editor:
A relative newcomer to the Coast, I sit on the sidelines reading local papers. Until now. News regarding logging of the Chapman Creek watershed startles me. Am I missing something? Please, illuminate me.
What I see is a gross failure of the SCRD to fulfill its primary mandate as warden of communal resources and protector of the Sunshine Coast’s integrity. Yet, AJB/Surespan is logging your source of water! How is this possible? (And, surely, this merits front page news …)
The SCRD is responsible for managing the watershed. Your watershed is under physical threat. The chair of SCRD states it “does not have the right” to remove Surespan. So, the SCRD throws its hands up, sorry we can’t do anything? Allowing a private interest to trump an essential communal good? Leaving it to a group of citizens to block the assault?
Why hasn’t the SCRD implemented a moratorium? If it doesn’t have jurisdiction, why isn’t the SCRD demanding action from those who do? One assumes the province sold the logging rights. At the time of the sale, was the watershed demarcated? If so, the province acted in bad faith. If not, when it was zoned, why wasn’t the lease amended? AJB/Surespan is a for-profit enterprise; a refund or land swap offers resolution. There are avenues, so why isn’t the SCRD pursuing them? It’s their job.
The SCRD has abdicated its primary responsibility and failed in leadership. SCRD leaders: You allow a watershed to be physically undermined because you say you don’t have the right to protect it? Then you have failed in your job, so please resign now and allow someone effective to step forward.
Meanwhile, hats off to ELF and shíshálh members for doing what’s necessary: physically protecting this core resource on which your communities, your very lives, depend.
Mcat Anderson, Elphinstone
