Vanderhoof LRMP Meetings, Friday, November 25 & Saturday, November 26, 2005
A quote I found in Michael Crichton's recent book, State of Fear, sums it up nicely:
Within any important issue, there are always aspects no one wishes to discuss.
—George Orwell
In the pursuit of formulating a Land and Resource Management Plan, there appear to be many voices, each with their own agenda, and their own set of fears and sensitivities.
Kudos to the staff of the various ministries involved, and especially to Romona Blackwell & Traci Leys-Schirok, for taking on this virtually insurmountable task.
Our area of interest, to put it in perspective, is the Alexander Mackenzie/Nuxalk-Carrier Grease Trail corridor, which runs through not only the Vanderhoof Land Management District, but also through the Quesnel and Chilcotin LMDs. Thus, we are only a minor interest in the district, perhaps 1/16th of the overall picture for the Vanderhoof project.
The primary item that came out of this meeting was that there is a joint-district committee being established with stakeholders to discuss future use of this corridor, and that will be held in a separate set of meetings.
The balance of the two day meeting was not a waste, as it did reveal to me much of how the various interests interact with each other. It appears each group has its own set of rights, limitations and some sort of a trump card to be played in the event the group does not get its way.
The two groups are divided reasonably evenly between government based, and public based.
Romona displayed an excellent example showing a single Hectare of land, and all the different levels of demand on it, using a MasterCard style "Priceless" comparison. In the example, the resources under the surface, mining, oil, gas, were valued very high; surface resources such as forest similarly valued; various licenses and tenures for guide outfitting, ranching, grow ops [:-)] fishing camps, recreational activities, each had their own value, and as a final point, "Getting out in the back country where it's quiet and I can relax" or something to that effect, was PRICELESS.
I had never thought of a single piece of land with so many interests in it. Even land that is privately owned is still subject to a number of the factors above. We then had the Ministry of Environment, wildlife branch, present an overview of how they manage the wildlife in the area. What came out of this, at least for me, is a quick synopsis of some of the interest groups, their desires, and their capability to effect change or maintenance of current conditions. Keep in mind that this is my bias coming through, and each of these groups would also have their own point of view as well.
I've probably named all the ministries wrong, but their names seem to be changing on a regular basis anyway, so you'll get the idea.
Ministry of Environment, Wildlife. To oversimplify, this ministry manages wild animals and hunting licenses. In terms of land use, this ministry has the right to assign hunting rights anywhere within the boundaries, except for in designated urban, provincial/federal parks and on private land. It is not bound by designated "backcountry" or protected areas of a land management plan. It does, however consider these plans and build policy and license rules accordingly. One thing to note, is that this branch is not in the Road restriction business. It has recognized that other government ministries can trump them on road usage, so it has found the better area of regulation for the wildlife branch is to regulate hunting season lengths, and quotas. There is a concern about "loop roads" into and out of the back country, since it makes it harder for conservation officers to enforce when a hunter can get out of the back country by several routes.
Ministry of Natural Resources, Oil, Gas. This ministry works mostly with resources under the surface. Since these resources often have the highest value in terms of land use, they most often end up taking the highest priority for usage, and trump nearly every other user type in terms of opening up roads and access points. they weren't represented at the meeting, but this appeared to be the overall feeling, that if Oil and Gas wanted roads, they'd get roads.
Ministry of Forest and Range. This ministry also has a very high level of trumping other interests due to the value of tree harvesting to the province. There appears to be more of an interest in the Ministry of Forests being the secondary user, not building new access points, but piggybacking on access points created by Oil and Gas, where possible. However, this winter vast amounts of Beetle Kill harvesting is being done in the area, thus a huge temporary road network has to be built to accommodate the removal of the trees. There appears to be a general trend, however for the ministires listed above to consult each other for road planning rather than to build parallel roads to the same place.
Ministry of Tourism, Sport and the Arts. This is the new kid on the block. the primary interest for us here is that this Ministry has now taken on management of all Forestry recreation sites in BC. No doubt we will be having discussions with them regarding Whipsaw. There was not a great deal of input from the representative of this ministry at the meeting, as I think they are still trying to get a handle on current assets/responsibilities before looking a t new ventures.
Guide Outfitters, association and individuals. Both the association as well as a number of individual guide outfitters were represented. These folks have an interest in keeping as much land as possible within the region absolutely as primitive and inaccessible as possible. This enables them to bring their hunting customers into pristine, roadless wilderness and sell the experience of not seeing another human being, or motorized vehicle for days. As you can imagine, this is getting harder and harder for them to do, as forestry and resource roads open up, which then opens the roads to recreational users. Guide Outfitters are generally opposed to motorized access, since it forces change to the movement of wildlife within their areas. While the guide outfitters often have licensed rights to large areas of the land, it needs to be remembered that they do not own or lease the crown land, rather share the right of use with other parties.
Wilderness Lodges. Some overlap exists here with Guide Outfitters, but the primary difference is that the lodges usually have the use/tenure license of a much smaller tract of land and either ownership or long term lease of the land their encampment is based on. These lodges sell the wilderness experience same as the guide outfitters, but usually base it on fishing or other adventure tourism activities.
Trappers. Trap line licenses exist, often overlapping the same land that the outfitters and lodges use. These are usually fairly remote and often include several cabins along the trap line. For the obvious reason of maintaining a good supply of wildlife to trap, the trappers are generally opposed to introduction of access to their areas. The other reason is the safety and liability issue of humans coming in contact with traps. Quite simply, they usually don't want additional human traffic into their areas.
Ranchers. These appear to be concerned mainly with grasslands and areas of cattle grazing. Encroachment of humans and vehicles into the large meadows, many which are barely reclaimed from swamp (and many going back to being swamp due to high water tables) is a concern for these folks. Several of the ranchers also make part of their living from guiding, and running lodges, so this packs an additional punch in their opposition to land access within their regions. However, many ranchers need to keep the basic corridors open in order to get supplies, deliver their goods to market, visit neighbors, etc., and in doing so, open the corridors for public use.
First Nations. This group has reserves in many areas, and as it applies to us, a couple of reserves right on the Mackenzie Trail corridor. This group would like to see access closed as it see public access as an infringement of their lands, however, the access corridors reach much further than the borders of Native reserves, and they have little control outside of their reserve borders. this group uses the primitive roads and trails regularly to haul diesel fuel into the reserves. This activity, while essential to the reserve life, is extremely hard on the primitive roads and results in a high degree of road erosion.
Recreational Users. Quads, snowmobiles, hikers, bikers, horse riders, and 4x4 all fall into this group. Most users in this group simply see crown land as their birthright - the access to it, and recreating on it is their right as Canadians. There definitely needs to be some rules of access (motorized) in a number of these areas, however, the prevailing thought is to make access the same for all, not available for some and available to others. Examples of trails open to Quads, but closed to 4x4s were mentioned. This promises to be the most contentious area of the process.
Mackenzie Trail Use — my thoughts. As a conclusion, I have a little more perspective now on the issue of Mackenzie Trail access for motorized vehicles. The fact that we've been able to make two trips through the corridor of this heritage trail, and the NCOAS has been able to do similar has put is on the list of stakeholders, which is not a bad thing.
In the previous Land Management Plan (1997), motorized access to the trail corridor was a point of conflict between the Guides, Ranchers, First Nations on one side of the issue, and the Federation of Wildlife on the other side of issue, wanting to maintain motorized access. The truth of the situation was that the Guides, Ranchers and First Nations did have and do use motorized access for their own purposes. There were supposed to be permits issued for these people to access, and others, such as individuals or groups like ours, could not get a permit. However, it is not clear if permits were ever put into place, what government body looked after issuing the permits, or who would enforce the permits. As a result, it is my opinion that our limited use of the corridor over the past 4 years has been somewhat under the radar. So long as we didn't say to much about it, they wouldn't either. I am told there are several in the no-access camp that are quite happy to see groups like ours, doing trail maintenance and treading as lightly as possible, but others have also warned that we are not wanted and could be chased off with bullets flying if we're not careful. That seems to me a good reason for being involved with the Mackenzie Trail access committee in the future.
I feel that the corridor should remain open to motorized vehicles, but would suggest that portions of it be closed during most of the year, opening only during the dry season. Due to beetle kill, the pine forests are not drawing water out of the land and low lying areas are wetter than usual. Thus closure of low lying areas for the next few years could also be considered, but not if it is a mechanism to get final access to the trail closed. I am in complete disagreement with Quads driving on the heritage trail where it leaves the main wagon trail, and also of any new trails being blazed, since this is a heritage site. But without groups like ours keeping the trail open and maintaining it, there will be no trail left for our children or grandchildren. Some might want to keep it open only to walkers or horseback riders, however, my firsthand experience is that there are very few recreational walkers or riders using the trail right now. In two traverses of the entire length of the trail I have seen one walker, a gentleman from Germany walking on his own, and three horses this year, some local women from Vanderhoof riding part of the trail. This, to me does not constitute enough usage at peak season to allow any maintenance of the trail or make it worthwhile to keep it open as a heritage site.
Next phase, I hope we as a club can be represented in future trail discussions and perhaps we can take an active part in trail maintenance, while balancing the needs and interests of the other groups with our own.
Dave Blair
President, RoverLanders of BC
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