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[skaha]

" If a store goes up beside my house, devaluing the property, should everyone pay for my loss?"   Yes: but with conditions.

--If when you bought the property it was not zoned commercial and if the long term plan for the area was residential only. If you bought the property (full disclosure from realtor) knowing that zoning may change or that there was not a plan in place indicating no commercial use then you took the risk and we shouldn't have to pay for the risk.

--Compensation: may not be in money... I assume the 30 m buffer is required with specific vegetation and machine operation restrictions as a default position thus any deviation from this requires a specific approved plan.

--Compensation could be in the form of technical assistance.. developing a machine that could operate on the area or a crop that could be grown with less buffer required, higher valued crop for the area or alternative economic use for the area.

--  

[penn]

Good points sandman . The issue is when you change the rules AFTER someone has bought in . If they bought in and then found rules like the 30 meter setback , then yes it's their own fault . But changing the rules later does come with accountability from the government . Don't want your tax dollars bailing some one out like that ? Then don't screw them over in the first place . Confiscating land is what dictatorships do . To anyone with morals , it is something commonly known as STEALING.

[jon5hill]

Another wrinkle to this story is the problem of flow. In the township of Langley, near Otter park (and several other watersheds) there are streams from which water is seasonally withdrawn by local farm owners for crop irrigation and direct watering. It's my understanding that the recovery strategy implemented by Dr. Pearson et al. includes provisions describing this problem and measures preventing the property owners from using as much creek water, particularly during periods of naturally low flow (summer months). This past summer I spent time working out in Langley with these two fish for a friends M.Sc project out of UBC. Her project is focusing on flow requirements for the SS and ND. I can say from experience that these creeks, especially Bertrand, is extremely susceptible to complete desiccation during summer periods. This reduces the available habitat by 80-90%.

In terms of compensation for these farmland owners - there really isn't any argument to be had. The farmers will be compensated accordingly for the devaluation of their property as a result of the implementation of SARA. The species at risk act was implemented by democratic means, and the implications are quite far reaching despite it's impotent history. If you don't want to foot the bill to protect endangered species, then move to another country, because the representatives in parliament were elected in part on the grounds of caring for the environment and Canada's indigenous species. To put it more plainly, if you don't want to pay your taxes to protect the Nooksack Dace and Salish Sucker, you are the minority.

This outcry undermines the more important issue here: That government officials are leery of adding other species to this list to avoid these types of public outcries. 

[alwaysfishn]

In terms of compensation for these farmland owners - there really isn't any argument to be had. The farmers will be compensated accordingly for the devaluation of their property as a result of the implementation of SARA. The species at risk act was implemented by democratic means, and the implications are quite far reaching despite it's impotent history. If you don't want to foot the bill to protect endangered species, then move to another country, because the representatives in parliament were elected in part on the grounds of caring for the environment and Canada's indigenous species. To put it more plainly, if you don't want to pay your taxes to protect the Nooksack Dace and Salish Sucker, you are the minority.

This outcry undermines the more important issue here: That government officials are leery of adding other species to this list to avoid these types of public outcries. 

That's probably because the majority still don't realize that the tax dollars that they are so ready to throw around, need to come out of their pockets!

[wav789]

What I think a lot of you are missing is that the vast majority of farmers in the Fraser Valley are dairy farmers with just enough land to grow enough feed for their animals.  Very few farmers have extra feed which they can sell to other farmers who do not have enough to last the year.  A large riparian zone setback will be devastating to many farms, as they will not be able to produce enough feed for their animals.  For most farmers, buying feed is not affordable, and neither is purchasing land for more feed.  This is why there is so much resistance by farmers, and why it would be so difficult to compensate them adequately for their loss.

[alwaysfishn]

That's a good argument but takes everyone down a slippery slope......

The farmers are willing to sacrifice the salish sucker, the loggers are okay with sacrificing the little owl, the fish farmers don't worry much about the wild salmon.....   Where does it stop?

[Sandman]

What I think a lot of you are missing is that the vast majority of farmers in the Fraser Valley are dairy farmers with just enough land to grow enough feed for their animals. 

I am not sure what you mean by this.  Pasture farming accounts for less than 20% of the land farmed in the Fraser Valley, with 60% being used for field crops.  This is all pasture, not just dairy, although cattle farms, milk cows & beef cows, account for 50% of the livestock farms, their total area is still quite small compared to field crops.  Now, certainly, the cattle farmers and other livestock farmers for that matter, are going to be more severely affected by the setback, for the reasons you mention, but they are far from the "vast majority" of farmers.  More importantly, perhaps, is the fact that it is the small livestock farmer (the one raising more "organic" livestock, grazed in pasture, as opposed to the large "factory" farms, which are becoming more predominant in the Fraser Valley) that are going to be hit hardest.  Perhaps what we need is a paradigm shift, whereby we start eating less meat and dairy and take the pressure off the agricultural land. Of course that will just drive down the price of the farmer's produce (as demand decreases), whereby the farmer is encouraged to maximize his production efficiency to cut costs leading us back to the problem that caused us to cut our consumption in the first place.

[wav789]

Sorry, my thinking was more directed to the eastern Fraser Valley (Chilliwack - Agassiz), where the Salish Sucker has recently made news.  I do not believe your numbers are correct for this area, but would be happy to find out where they came from.  My point was, however, that the resistance farmers (especially smaller farmers) are demonstrating is because a riparian zone setback will impact their livelihood immensely.  Not to mention that they find it difficult to have a setback imposed on ditches and field swales that they made.

[alwaysfishn]

These ditches and field swales were made by the farmers to replace the small creeks and ponds that had been filled over the years (before regulations were in place to prevent this). That's where the salish suckers lived before the ditches were made.....

[skaha]

--the 30 m setback must be a default when no prescription or mitigation is proposed or in place?

--there are many ways to affect water temp and flow... in particular if these critters are now living in man made ditches that have replaced their natural habitat... some portion of the ditches must be able to be moved or routed into rearing or holding areas for breeding and protection from predators, lack of water or unhealthy water temperatures or chemical changes.

--It may turn out that the default measures are required or even that they are not enough to adequately protect these species.  The intent of the SARA was to have some general rules to hopefully stop or reduce harm to the listed species while research is focused and funded to come up with a viable plan. It is not intended that these default rules be implemented in perpetuity unless it is found they are required.

[Sandman]

Sorry, my thinking was more directed to the eastern Fraser Valley (Chilliwack - Agassiz), where the Salish Sucker has recently made news.  I do not believe your numbers are correct for this area, but would be happy to find out where they came from.

My numbers are from a Ministry of Agriculture and Lands brief on agriculture in the Fraser Valley Regional District (this is the eastern Fraser Valley including the municipalities of Abbotsford, Chilliwack, Hope, Kent and Mission, as well as the electoral districts of Hatzic Prairie, Nicomen Island,  Hemlock Valley, Sumas Mountain, Columbia Valley, Popkum, Yale, and Boston Bar).  The brief was put out in 2001 (so the numbers are 10 years old), but I do not think the numbers have changed dramatically in nature of the farming done in the area, only in the number of farms (there is a growing trend towards larger "factory" farms in the Fraser Valley as elsewhere).  The brief does show that while the number of farms had shrunk by 10% (the area farmed also declined by 10%) in the 10 years previous (from 1991-2001), the number of livestock had not shrunk as much, and in some cases (poultry and pigs) had actually increased.   The number of dairy farms specifically had declined by 19% in those ten years while the area of pasture lands (both managed and unmanaged) declined by 40%, however, the number of milk cows dropped only 2%.  This shows that farmers in the Fraser Valley are consolidating into larger operations, and most are really pushing the limits on their land (the fact that average farm size in the Fraser Valley remained steady at 18.3 hectares in that time, shows that the farms are not getting any larger in area, only more crowded).  This is why many farmers (especially livestock farmers) are so concerned about the idea of ANY setback as they are already on the margins with little wriggle room.  Does this mean we need to give up on a species at risk?  Or does it mean we need to understand the farmers concerns and find a solution that saves a threatened species without unfairly penalizing the farmer.

[canso]

people work there whole lives to pay for the land they live on and or farm on.


I can't imagine loosing any land I own to a government.

[Sandman]

people work there whole lives to pay for the land they live on and or farm on.
I can't imagine loosing any land I own to a government.

The expropriation of privately owned land, in whole or part, by the government for public use and benefit, is as old as the country itself.  While the power of expropriation is often recognized as an important component of government, the result is almost always a traumatic experience for the property owner.  The laws governing expropriation in Canada have undergone a complete restructuring in the last 20 years, and almost all expropriation statutes across the provinces (BC included) now provide for just compensation. While this compensation has shifted from the concept of "value to owner" to "market value", subsequent revisions to provincial expropriation statutes have resulted in a hybrid formula that tries to find a middle ground between "the fair market value" at the time of expropriation, and the value to the owner (taking into considerations the unseen costs of moving or changing the interest in the remaining land once the expropriated land is removed).  According to Antoine F. Hacault of Thompson Dorfman Sweatman, Barristers & Solicitors,  the current federal Expropriation Act, 1985, was "enacted to clarify the subjective system of expropriation and remove the arbitrary features associated with the [then] existing law."  Now each province has its own Expropriation Act, and the purpose of these remedial statutes "is to adequately compensate the owner of land, which is taken from him to serve the public interest."

If Canadian statutes since 1886 (the date of Canada's original Expropriations Act) recognized the "traumatic experience" that expropriation inflicts on land owners, and Section 31(1) of BC's own Expropriation Act, 1996, recognizes the courts obligation to "...award as compensation to an owner the market value of the owner's estate or interest in the expropriated land plus reasonable damages for disturbance...," and Section 64 (1) of SARA states that "the Minister may, in accordance with the regulations, provide fair and reasonable compensation to any person for losses suffered as a result of any extraordinary impact of [the establishment of critical habitat under the relevant sections of the act]."   How is it then that the government is now able to now change the rules and say they are going to expropriate land without compensation?  This is another example of the Liberal Government's arrogance and contempt for the laws of the people they serve, where they feel they can simply write a new law if the present laws do not suit their current agenda.  While I am happy that the Liberals have become born again "environmentalists", like the ill fated carbon tax that came before it, this appears to be another poorly conceived and now borderline criminally executed plan.

[wav789]

My numbers are from a Ministry of Agriculture and Lands brief on agriculture in the Fraser Valley Regional District (this is the eastern Fraser Valley including the municipalities of Abbotsford, Chilliwack, Hope, Kent and Mission, as well as the electoral districts of Hatzic Prairie, Nicomen Island,  Hemlock Valley, Sumas Mountain, Columbia Valley, Popkum, Yale, and Boston Bar).  The brief was put out in 2001 (so the numbers are 10 years old), but I do not think the numbers have changed dramatically in nature of the farming done in the area, only in the number of farms (there is a growing trend towards larger "factory" farms in the Fraser Valley as elsewhere).  The brief does show that while the number of farms had shrunk by 10% (the area farmed also declined by 10%) in the 10 years previous (from 1991-2001), the number of livestock had not shrunk as much, and in some cases (poultry and pigs) had actually increased.   The number of dairy farms specifically had declined by 19% in those ten years while the area of pasture lands (both managed and unmanaged) declined by 40%, however, the number of milk cows dropped only 2%.  This shows that farmers in the Fraser Valley are consolidating into larger operations, and most are really pushing the limits on their land (the fact that average farm size in the Fraser Valley remained steady at 18.3 hectares in that time, shows that the farms are not getting any larger in area, only more crowded).  This is why many farmers (especially livestock farmers) are so concerned about the idea of ANY setback as they are already on the margins with little wriggle room.  Does this mean we need to give up on a species at risk?  Or does it mean we need to understand the farmers concerns and find a solution that saves a threatened species without unfairly penalizing the farmer.

I understand how you came by these numbers (http://www.agf.gov.bc.ca/resmgmt/sf/agbriefs/FVRD.pdf). However, you fail to recognize that what you were comparing previously was pasture land to field crops.  There is not a lot of pasture land when compared to the amount of field crops, but pasture land is not used that frequently by Valley farmers.  Instead, almost all of all farmers' land is used for corn silage,grass silage and hay and alfalfa.  Therefore, these crops are listed in the Field Crops category.  The brief in question does not break down the Field Crop category further, but a more in-depth study (this time of Chilliwack) by the Ministry of Agriculture and Lands explains this more clearly.

http://www.agf.gov.bc.ca/resmgmt/sf/agoverviews_2006census/Chilliwack_Ag_Overview.pdf

Specifically, pages 7 and 8.

[quill]

This is another example of the Liberal Government's arrogance and contempt for the laws of the people they serve, where they feel they can simply write a new law if the present laws do not suit their current agenda.  While I am happy that the Liberals have become born again "environmentalists", like the ill fated carbon tax that came before it, this appears to be another poorly conceived and now borderline criminally executed plan.

I can't comment on other parts of your argument, but I think maybe you're confusing the two levels of government. SARA is a federal law and the BC Liberals have nothing to do with it. BC has no endangered species laws--how's that for stillborn? 

http://www.sararegistry.gc.ca/approach/strategy/background/responsible_e.cfm