EAGLE VALLEY
NEWS
Safety advocate questions state of Bruhn Bridge Page 2
Ladybugs part of district arsenal against pests Page 3
Wednesday, July 31, 2013 PM40008236
Vol. 55 No. 30 Sicamous, B.C., • 1.25 (GST included) • www.eaglevalleynews.com
Pulling together: Twenty-three canoes including those of the five local bands, Adams Lake, Neskonlith, Splats’in, Little Shuswap and Kamloops, along with guests including Shuswap MLA Greg Kyllo, pictured in the canoe above, left Mara Lake Saturday morning on a 15-kilometre trip to Old Town Bay for the first leg in the 2013 Pulling Together Canoe Journey. This floating cultural exchange will end Friday when the canoes travel from Pritchard to Kamloops, where they will be part of the Grand Entry at the Kamloops Pow Wow. Photo by Martha Wickett
Planned dock removal raises ire of residents and mayor By Lachlan Labere and Barb Brouwer Eagle Valley News
SLIPP may be slipping out of control and there are fears local dock owners are being targeted by the province. This was the message put forward by Sicamous Mayor Darrell Trouton at last week’s district council meeting in response to a letter from White Pine Crescent residents Rick and Jean Ellithorpe, who are upset with what they call the “bullying approach” the Ministry of Forests, Lands and Natural Resource Operations is taking to waterfront property owners regarding existing docks. In their letter, the Ellithorpes ask that council intervene on the behalf of all affected dock owners. But the ministry’s Steve Tomson, Minister of Forests, Lands and Resource Operations, says they are not planning on removing docks this summer and is working on processes to make licence acquisition much easier. He says the ministry plans to use education to get compliance Derelict docks are being cleaned up in the Salmon Arm area through SLIPP, the Shus-
wap Lake Inte“The whole grated Planning SLIPP thing is Process. Marcin basically taboo Pachcinski, Coin Sicamous,” It has to be set up better so Trouton told the lumbia Shuswap there’s not a misrepresentation board, noting that Regional District of what we’re trying to at a SLIPP stakeParks and Recaccomplish, and that’s what I holders’ meeting reation manager, feel has been done. says the latest in that commudata reveals there nity in June, he Darrell Trouton are a total of 2,700 agreed with conMayor docks total on cerns about waMara and Shuster quality with wap lakes, and more than 90 per cent are able regard to drinking water and recreation, but to get tenure by applying for a licence. heard from one government agency their Trouton said council is planning discuss perspective was to protect fish. “I won’t supthe issue with the provincial ministers at port this until we as directors decide that we the upcoming Union of B.C. Municipali- even want it.” ties Convention. This, however, was after he Trouton expressed frustration at the way laid into SLIPP, reiterating concerns he ex- he says SLIPP, a body that proclaims it has pressed as a director on the Columbia Shus- no compliance powers, did a catalogue of wap Regional District board. docks on the lake and promptly handed it Recently, the CSRD board deferred a de- over to the Ministry of Forest, Lands and cision to allocate $50,000 to explore the fea- Resource Operations, which has plans to sibility of continuing to fund SLIPP. remove several docks in the Sicamous area.
“We paid them to do the studies and now the ministry is going ahead with compliance,” he said. Even with the CSRD board approving the deferral, Trouton told Sicamous councillors that he still felt he had been ignored, explaining how, even after the board’s decision, Area C South Shuswap director Paul Demenok, the SLIPP steering committee chair, still plans to make his own presentation at UBCM to garner the premier’s support. Trouton wants SLIPP to focus solely on water quality, with clear language defining its mandate. As for the province using SLIPP’s data for enforcement purposes, Trouton says there needs to be greater transparency in what SLIPP is about and working towards. “At the director level, we’re getting asked to support this, these types of initiatives, especially through SLIPP… but we’re not getting clarification,” said Trouton. “It has to be set up better so there’s not a misrepresentation of what we’re trying to accomplish, and that’s what I feel has been done.”