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Log and Flog Displaces Forest Land
by Richard Boyce
 I just walked through the 'not-a-clear-cut' logged area between Qualicum Beach and Coombs. The second growth forest, once considered a buffer from previous logging, has just been leveled. 'Single stem variable retention logging' at its finest.
Like sentinels left standing on a bleak and desolate landscape, a few deformed trees remain. A jumble of stumps, exposed root-balls, shattered trunks, branches, and exposed ground cover are all that remain.
Water from Hamilton Marsh flows directly into this wasteland on its way into French Creek. Heavy rains are flushing the silt, mud, and debris exposed by this logging operation into the tributaries of French Creek. Down stream are salmon enhancement projects, community water intakes, housing for thousands, and banks subject to erosion and collapse when run-off swells the creek.
This area is owned by Island Timberlands, which is owned by
Brascan, which has changed its name to Brookfield. This "Global Asset
Management Company" has just come out of a long strike with local
forestry workers. Having logged this area they will be selling the land
to a real-estate firm. In order for the unnamed developers to
sub-divide and sell this land for residential and commercial uses they
will have to apply to the Regional District of Nanaimo for rezoning
permits to take this land out of its forest management designation.
This will likely be approved unless the public takes a stand.
According
to the Official Community Plan, established by the RDN and dedicated
members of this community, this land is specifically reserved for
forest management. The logged area closest to the Inland Highway is
part of the RDN Area "G" while the clear-cut along what was once the
'Coombs cut-off' is in Area "F." Rezoning would have to be approved by
the RDN Board of Directors, which includes both local mayors.
The
forest around Hamilton Marsh is also owned by Island Timberlands, which
recently rejected a fair market value offer from the Regional District
of Nanaimo in partnership with Ducks Unlimited Canada to purchase the
land and protect it as park. Based on the direction Brookfield is
taking, all forestland in the area will be logged and sold to real
estate developers.
The provincial governments - the NDP
initiated this legislation and the BC Liberals boast they have
completed the task - claim they have protected 12% of the land base as
parks. However, the majority of people living on Vancouver Island are
concentrated along a thin corridor along the east coast from Campbell
River south. In that area less than 7% of the land has been protected
as parks. The primary reason is because industry and private people own
most of the land.
All of the land between Victoria and Courtney
along the East Coast of Vancouver Island, along with all land West to a
line that runs between Port Renfrew and Port Alberni, is privately
owned. In 1884 Prime Minister John A. Macdonald convinced coal magnate
Robert Dunsmuir to build the Esquimalt and Nanaimo Railway, something
he had promised the citizens of British Columbia in order for them to
join confederation in 1871. The government in Ottawa paid Dunsmuir
$750,000 cash and 2.1 million acres of land on Vancouver Island along
with all mineral rights.
Over the years the E&N lands were
sold to small and large companies as well as to private individuals. As
a result this entire Dunsmuir land area is not accessible to the
general public and remains out of the jurisdiction of all levels of
government. Most streams, lakes and swamps on the east side the island
are held privately, including the bed of the water body.
One way
out of this land squeeze is to limit re-zoning of land to that of the
OCP. As it stands, the land Island Timberlands has logged is not zoned
for housing or commercial development. Should they decide to 'donate'
the entire forest around Hamilton Marsh to the RDN as a park, then
their development firms may have a chance for re-zoning. Until then the
limitation of forestland remains in place.
Contact
Electoral Area "F" Director Lou Biggemann and Area "G" Director Joe
Stanhope at Regional District of Nanaimo 6300 Hammond Bay Road Nanaimo,
BC V9T 6N2 as well as Community Planning 954-3798 E-mail:
Planning@rdn.bc.ca
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