Addressing Community Concerns
In addition to making decisions about local LCC/CRD services, Salt Spring’s CRD Director must deal with a wide range of other local government-related issues. Some of these are commonly-discussed topics while others might be emerging or unexpected issues.
In making your choice on election day, I hope you will consider the values of candidates as well as their analytical and communication skills. By doing this, there’s a better chance that your chosen candidate will respond appropriately to a range of issues
If I am elected CRD Director in October, I will work to address issues that matter to Salt Springers. Here are some examples of community concerns that I believe will need attention:
Determine whether (and how) to revise the Salt Spring noise bylaw to better protect agriculture and the island’s rural character
Over recent years, Salt Spring’s ‘rooster wars’ have received a lot of attention on the island and elsewhere. Underlying the conflict between some small-scale farmers and their non-farming neighbours are some contradictions within and between Islands Trust and CRD bylaws.
On the one hand, Salt Spring’s current Official Community Plan and zoning bylaws permit residents in much of the island to do agriculture as has been done on the island for more than 150 years. Many of Salt Spring’s zones that permit housing equally permit farming, including the many areas of the island zoned ‘Rural.’
Meanwhile, the CRD noise and animal control bylaws protect farming through an exemption that has been interpreted as only applying to lots in the Agricultural Land Reserve. Which means nuisance complaints relating to normal farming practices are handled differently depending on whether the lot is in the ALR or not. The zoning of a lot might permit agriculture as a principal use, but if it’s not in the ALR, then the farmer is vulnerable.
The solution to this issue is not obvious, as it’s unlikely the Local Trust Committee will be fundamentally changing its zoning regime anytime soon. Farmers have a right to farm, while at the same time, some non-farmer residents in areas of small lots have expectations that don’t match those of their farmer neighbours.
In my view, we need to bring together our Local Trust Committee, our LCC and community members for a (preferably calm) discussion of this conundrum and some problem-solving. Should the CRD nuisance bylaws be revised? Perhaps. But first let’s have that conversation.
Revitalize cross-agency watershed protection activities
For many years (since 2013, to be exact), Salt Spring agencies and organizations with an interest in protecting our freshwater resources worked together through the Salt Spring Island Watershed Protection Alliance, known as SSIWPA. Established and funded through an Islands Trust bylaw, SSIWPA worked to share information and resources and coordinate watershed protection action across agencies.
SSIWPA has not met for several years now and its most recent project – the development of a watershed protection plan for the island – was not fully considered and approved as it should have been (no elected Salt Spring CRD representative signed off on it, for example). Yet watershed protection is increasingly important.
There has been debate over which agency should take the lead on organizing and funding SSIWPA. I believe it’s time for the participants to get back together, hash out how to move forward and get on with the job. And the LCC – which did not exist when SSIWPA did most of its work – should be part of that discussion.
Continue working to resolve harbour management issues
Another area where government agencies have spent more time pointing fingers than actually dealing with pressing issues is harbour management. For many years, federal, provincial and local government agencies have either pointed at each other or avoided saying much of anything while Ganges Harbour – and to a lesser extent, other Salt Spring harbours – has seen significant numbers of unregistered and uninspected moorings and attached vessels, some in a poor state of repair.
We’ve been told about 50 people are currently living in Ganges Harbour, some because they cannot find decent housing on land. And we know there are derelict vessels out there and, a times, significant amounts of floating (or sinking) waste.
Issues in the harbour are complex and local government has good reason to be nervous about stepping in where the federal and provincial governments have not always fulfilled their responsibilities. However, ignoring the issues does not solve them, so I am happy our LCC took the initiative to bring together the relevant agencies, harbour-dwellers and interested community members in two roundtable discussions of harbour issues and has also committed to a gathering of the involved agencies in the near future to sort out who is going to do what in our harbour.
This is a tricky topic, given the overlapping government jurisdictions, significant environmental and safety concerns and the realities of a serious housing shortage. But we need to continue moving forward on it.
If I am elected CRD Director in October, I will work with the LCC to make sure we work with the other relevant agencies and take on these complex issues.