Save Our Valley

March 30, 2006

Save Our Valley

On Friday, March 31st, Port Alberni's "Save Our Valley Alliance" is conducting a 24 hour count of logging trucks hauling logs and jobs out of their valley.

On March 8th protesters, including Port Alberni Mayor Ken McRae, participated in a demonstration organized by the Save Our Valley Alliance in which they held up logging trucks for as long as 90 minutes. That protest was sparked by the provincial government removing private lands from tree farm licenses with a consequent increase in harvest levels, environmental degradation and raw log exports from private lands. On the afternoon of the protest, Alberni-Qualicum NDP MLA Scott Fraser used question period to bring the demonstration to the attention of the Minister of Forests Rich Coleman. The Minister said:

"The protest today was with regards to some private land issues on private land forests within the farm licences. They're managed under forest development plans. Once removed from a tree farm licence, private lands are managed under the Private Managed Forest Land Act. The Private Managed Forest Land Council is an independent provincial agency established to administer the managed forest program and has held talks with the alliance that has some concerns about this."

"The council is investigating the complaints about the effect of the logging trucks and the issues in and around water quality, as I understand it, and I understand that process is continuing."

Coleman was referring to water-quality problems in Beaver Creek. The Vancouver Island Health Authority is responsible for monitoring water quality. On March 29th its website advised that "there are currently no boil water advisories in the VIHA region". Archived alerts have not been updated on the Authority's website since July 20, 2004 - almost two years ago. The problems in Beaver Creek appear to have escaped notice on the Health Authority's website, but local media have reported that the community has seen several boil-water advisories in the past few months.

Annual reports found on the Private Managed Forest Land Council's website note that under the Private Managed Forest Land Act and its regulations, minimum standards of practice for the protection of water quality are specified. Little else of use with respect to the protester's concerns can be found on the Council's website. Division 4 of regulation 336/2004 specifies what owners must do to safeguard water and section 23 allows holders of licenses for licensed water supply intakes, who identify problems, to require private forest land owners to take measures to address the problems. Of course, disagreements are bound to arise over whether the private land owner is responsible for any particular problem.

The Save Our Valley Alliance is doing a day long count on March 31st because of concern over log exports. When Fraser asked Coleman about log exports, Coleman ducked responsibility by saying that the regulation of log exports from private lands was a federal matter. Residents of the Port Alberni area are not going to idly stand by and see their valley lose its economic and environmental base. According to BC Stats, provincial population increased from 3.87 million in 1996 to 4.25 million in 2005, an increase of 9.8%. Most of the increase, 249,388 out of 380,246, occurred in the GVRD. Population in the Alberni-Clayoquot regional district has shown no growth, and in fact a slight decline from 32,842 in 1996 to 32,692 in 2005. The resource communities, which form the economic backbone of the province, are facing dramatic adjustments as a result of the Campbell government's changes to forestry practices.

On March 7th, NDP forestry critic, Bob Simpson asked Coleman whether he is paying attention to workers and communities or just company CEOs. Coleman responded that there has to be "the reinvention of the coast forest sector in British Columbia" but he failed to say what the Campbell government would do to help families and communities through that reinvention. In Port Alberni they aren't going to wait passively. On March 31st they'll be counting trucks, but don't be surprised if another day comes when they're stopping trucks if they can't get satisfactory answers from the Campbell government.