© Eco-Logic ¢

WHEN YOU'RE wrong, you're wrong. And the only thing
to do is admit it. Accordingly, an apology to North Van-
couver Mayor Marilyn Baker is in order.

Last November, I wrote a col-
umn concerning the Lynn Canyon
Park. | mentioned the depth of
feeling among North Vancouver
resideuts over the threat of the
park being developed ‘‘no matter
how determinedly Mayor Marilyn
Baker tries to sweep the issue
under the rug.”’

This opinion was based on my
files and several conversations and
exchanges of correspondence with
the Save Lynn Canyon Park
Association (SLCPA).

It has been pointed out to me
that, in fact, in May 1989, North
Vancouver District Council unan-
imously agreed to a special review
of the 1985 Seymour Official
Community Plan, which had made
provision for two potential
neighborhoods on the plateau be-
tween Lynn Creek and Seymour
River.

Nobody, least of all the mayor,
was sweeping anything ‘‘under the
rug.”

I also wrote: ‘‘The shock of the
discovery that only 25 per cent of
what everybody knows as Lynn
Canyon Park is actually designated
as parkland has not faded away —
quite the reverse.”

It was less of a discovery, as
things turn out, than a mis-impres-
sion. The fact that 40,000 peti-
tion-signers got it wrong as well as
me is small consolation.

As Mayor Baker put it in a Sept.
15 letter-to-the-editor: ‘*‘Some
350-plus acres stretching from Rice
Lake Road south to the landfill
have long been, and will continue
to be, Lynn Canyon Park in all its
wilderness glory.”

The suspension bridge, which |
had been Ied to believe was also
possibly threatened, is
“sacrosanct,’’ the mayor affirms.

As for the proposed new
neighborhoods, quoth the mayor
further:

“Increased environmental
awareness and appreciation of the
wilderness areas have brought into
question residential development
on these publically owned lands.
And, in North Vancouver District
Council’s unanimous view, rightly
so.

“That is why council has
responded by showing these arcas
as ‘Under Review' in the District
Official Community Plan Bylaw.
That is why we have hired consul-
tants to review land-use options in
conjunction with a committee in-
cluding ratepayers, users and en-
vironmental groups. That is why
we will await the consultant’s
report and recommendations be-
fore proceeding with the Official
Community Plan and further
public hearings ... Development of
Lynn Canyon Park is NOT an
issue.””

Mayor Baker, you were right. I
was wrong. What can | say? If f
happen to see you hesitating before
a puddle, permit me to lay my pea
jacket across it for you...

Speaking of famous parks,
here’s an intriguing development
concerning the spanking new na-
tional park on South Moresby
Island.

I got this story out of Kahtoa,
the excelleat paper put out by the
Native Communications Society of
B.C. (“Kahtoa’’ is Chinook,
meaning ‘to become informed.’*)

Everyone will remember the
agreement signed by the B.C. and
federal governments in 1987 to
create the South Moresby Park.

After a court battle to prevent
logging around a creek that the
Haida felt was being destroyed had
failed, the native people turned to
protests which eventually created
the right conditions for Ottawa
and Victoria to climb in bed to
create a national park.

A group called the Residents’
Planning Advisory Commitice was
set up to oversee development of
the park,

Because the Haida are stil! deep-
ly involved in unresolved land
claims negotiations with Ottawa
(which Victoria refuses to have
anything to do with) the Council
of the Haida Nation decided at the
time not to sit on the planning ad-
visory committee. Without an
agreement in principle between the
feds and the Haida council, such
participation might easily com-
promise their land claims position.

But once the committee was
formed, native leaders realized that
once again they were on the out-
side looking in. They decided to
have an observer sit in on the
cominittee sessions to keep an eye
on things.

The observer, Haida councillor
Gary Russ, soon found himself at
odds with the committee over a
plan to spend $13 million setting
up a visitor’s reception area and
small craft harbor in Sandspit.

Russ wanted it built somewhere
else. But was of course over-ruled.

So much for native participa-
tion.

Russ notes that 6! loggers who
were put out of work by the clos-
ing of logging on South Moresby
have been paid $8,000 since the
park was created. The natives?
Nothing.

‘This concept of native land
claims seems to be turning into
non-native land claims,”’ Russ
says, ‘‘where all the non-native
logging companies, individual log-
gers and different non-native
communities on the island are
receiving all the benefits.”’

He finds it ironic that logging
companies made enormous profits
from cutting trees on Haida land.
And then, when they had their tree
farm licence withdrawn, the logg-
ing companies ended up being
compensated for not cutting those
trees, so they make more money
again.

Ironic indeed! But somehow all
vaguely familiar sounding...@

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