Stoltmann Wilderness being sold out!
White Pine Falls, Upper Lilloet Valley. Photo credit: Ian Mackenzie
In the Spring of 1995 the NDP government set up a thirteen-member Regional Public Advisory's Committee (RPAC) to quietly reach consensus on which of the Lower Mainland's few remaining wilderness areas would remain wild and which ones would be open for development-especially clearcut logging. Invited onto RPAC were Interfor and the IWA along with two self-acclaimed "moderate" environment groups, B.C. Wild and the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society. Although the creation of new parks was the expected outcome of the process, instead of the B.C. Provincial Parks Branch, the B.C. Lands Branch (notoriously pro-development), represented the Environment Ministry on RPAC.
The monthly RPAC meetings were not open for the general public to observe, unlike those of the earlier Pinecone Lake/Burke Mountain process. The Wilderness Committee was worried: if the 13 RPAC members were left to their secret negotiations, most of the remaining wilderness in the Lower Mainland would be lost in trade-offs and compromises to keep the total area of parks under the arbitrary ceiling established by the government, 13 percent of the land base.
In the fall of 1995, the Wilderness Committee launched a campaign to bring RPAC's back-room deal-making to public attention.
We started by picketing outside the RPAC meetings, demanding that they be opened to public scrutiny. RPAC refused. Next we established a protest camp on the Legislative Lawns in Victoria, asking that government hold public open-house meetings in all Lower Mainland communities to give people an opportunity to review RPAC's proposed park plan and say how much local park protection they want. The NDP government said "No we don't have time." We said, "there always time for democracy!"
WCWC Supports Aboriginal Title
Western Canada Wilderness Committee believe that social justice for First Nations is a prerequisite to lasting environmental protection. We support the work of indigenous peoples to safeguard their traditional homelands and ensure the survival of their cultures. We believe that the rights of indigenous peoples to their homelands are inalienable and their traditional stewardship of Earth's resources can serve as an example of how we can live in sustainable harmony with our natural world. The Stoltmann Wilderness Area is within the traditional territories of the Klahoose, Lil'wat, Sechelt and Squamish First Nations.
Our Legislature Lawn camp-out continued for nearly two months, becoming the longest running protest in B.C. legislature history.
When the legislative guards said we couldn't have a tent on the Lawn, we put out tent on castor wheels and towed it around like a wagon. When the guards said that wouldn't do, we filled our tent with helium balloons and suspended it over the Lawn, drawing attention to the government's undemocratic stance on the Lower Mainland park planning process and raising the profile of the largest wilderness area threatened by the RPAC negotiations-the Stoltmann Wilderness.
In the weeks before the April 28 election call, RPAC representatives apparently reached a tentative agreement on which Lower Mainland wilderness areas they'd recommend for preservation (although we've heard that they didn't actually sign the agreement). RPAC's environmental representatives have refused to give us a copy of their park plan map, but we've been told that most of the Stoltmann Wilderness is slated for development. Of the Stoltmann's 260,000 hectares approximately 55,000, about one-fifth of the area, was recommended for preservation.
RPAC recommended that Sims Creek, the Upper Elaho and the lower elevations and tributary streams of the Upper Lillooet-three of the Stoltmann's four big pristine valleys-be logged. Sims Creek, the Upper Elaho, and the Lillooet tributary valleys of Salal, Boulder, and North Creeks represent the ecological heartland and most important recreation areas of the Stoltmann.
RPAC's plan calls for clearcutting the vast majority of the economic timber and the very last big stands of coastal Douglas fir. It guts the Stoltmann of its ecological integrity. How can environment groups like the B.C. Wild and the Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society even contemplate signing off on a deal like this?
Ancient redcedar in the Upper Elaho. Photo credit: Kate Hill
On May 28 Premier Glen Clark and the NDP were entrusted with the reigns of power to govern B.C. through to the end of the millennium. It's a four year period during which British Columbians could protect sufficient wilderness to preserve biodiversity, clean water and a healthy environment for our children, or bicker our way down to saving only 12 percent of B.C.'s lands-following in the footsteps of the U.S. where it's becoming clear that 12 percent preservation is insufficient to preserve grizzlies, wolves and salmon.
The Wilderness Committee urges our new NDP government to bring democracy back to the Lower Mainland park planning process. Government now has the time to plan open house public meetings, giving people the chance to let it know what kind of Lower Mainland park system they want. We are confident that Lower Mainland residents will say, preserve the entire 260,000 hectare Stoltmann Wilderness!
