Shuswap Environmental Action Society

PRESS RELEASE

Salmon Arm’s “Defend our Coast” action a record breaker!

Protest draws 200+ people – largest rally in the Thompson-Okanagan

Watch the video at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=grtsCk2pcm4

The Shuswap has what it takes when it comes to standing up for protecting the province from efforts to build more pipelines and add more tankers to the coastline. On October 24th, over 6200 people attended 76 rallies at MLA offices across the province organized by LeadNow, an independent advocacy organization that brings generations of Canadians together to achieve progress through democracy. According to the LeadNow website, which provides details about all the events, there were only four communities with larger rallies than Salmon Arm and we had more participants than the larger nearby communities of Kamloops, Vernon and Kelowna!

“The success of our rally shows how there is a strong concern for the environment in our community,” explained Jim Cooperman, Shuswap Environmental Action Society (SEAS) president, “and it indicates how effective SEAS and Salmon Arm KAIROS are in organizing events.”

The rally was held across the street from George Abbott’s office so that the large crowd, which spilled out into the street, did not block the doorways of stores and coffee shops. An open microphone provided an opportunity for participants to speak about the issues they felt were most important.  Neskonlith Band member, Louie Thomas, delivered important First Nation perspectives about why the pipeline should not be built.

Other issues covered included the need for sustainable, alternative forms of energy; the threats to B.C.’s salmon streams posed by the pipelines; the dirty legacy of the many spills so far from pipelines and tankers; the massive pollution occurring in the Alberta tar sands; the foolishness of the Christy Clark government’s attempt to demand more money from Alberta for the pipeline; and the fact that the pipeline would only benefit the corporations and the “oily one percent.”

There were many creative protest signs with important messages, including: “Respect Indigenous Rights, Death by Oil Tar; Export Harper; I Don’t Trust Big Oil; Enbridge – Bad for Nature; Bad for People, BC is Not for Sale; Oil Spoils; Harper’s Laws are Incontinent; and, Wanted – Harper – For Gutting Environmental Regulations.”

Anne Morris with KAIROS, a national church-based organization, spoke about the strong opposition to the pipeline/supertankers plan by more than 130 First Nations who have declared that they will not allow the Gateway Pipelines to cross their lands, territories and watersheds. “Climate change is also a big issue”, said Ms. Morris. “The Gateway Pipeline would mean a 30 per cent increase in tar sands operations, which are already Canada’s largest source of greenhouse gas emissions and the reason Canada is unlikely to meet even its own very weak commitments to greenhouse gas reduction.”

“I told the crowd how the Harper government has signed a likely unconstitutional, investment and promotion treaty with China that will allow their mega-corporations to sue any level of government in Canada that restricts their access to our resources,” explained Cooperman, “and that these cases would be decided by non-Canadian, third party arbitrators. And that Canada is basically handing over its sovereignty to Communist China through this trade deal that is going ahead without any debate in parliament.”

At the end of the 45-minute rally, the group sang in unison a pipeline protest song by Sylvain Vallee, with this chorus, “Mama they’re playing with our future, trying to sell our country out through the pipeline. Harper you’re playing with our future you’re trying to sell our country out through the pipeline. Harper you’ve got a revolution for trying to sell our country out through the pipeline.”

To learn more about the October 24th Defend Our Coast province-wide events, visit www.defendourcoast.ca

Shuswap musician and activist Sylvian Vallee and his partner, artist Lynn Erin have written a reggae tar pipeline protest song, that will be sung at the October 24th rally at noon in front of George Abbott’s office in Salmon Arm. Click here to listen to the song: Pipeline

Click here to download the song: Pipeline Protest Song

Click here to watch the music video Pipeline – the protest music video

Here are the lyrics:

Pipeline
Words by Sylvain Vallee and Lynn Erin
Music by Sylvain Vallee

Mama they’re playing with our future, trying to sell our country out through the pipeline.

Mama they’re playing with our future, trying to sell our country out through the pipeline.

Is this worth a gamble?
A thousand rivers and coastal waters

One leak, say goodbye
to the pristine Great Bear Rain Forest

Mama they’re talkin’ super-tankers threatening our coastline feeding from the pipeline.

Mama we’re thinking revolution, they’re trying to sell our country out through the pipeline.

Tar Sands claim they’re ethical!
As pipelines spout new leaks

a toxic sacrifice
so the self-proclaimed few steal paradise

Mama they’re talking revolution he’s trying to sell our country out through the pipeline.

People we need a revolution before we see our country flow through the pipeline.

Money killed the electric car
Chose to spoil our air
Now it’s time to rise up, stand up!
be free!, be democracy!

Mama they’re playing with our future, trying to sell our country out through the pipeline.  [repeats 4x]

harper you’re playing with our future you’re trying to sell our country out through
the pipeline.

Mama they’re playing with our future, trying to sell our country out through the pipeline.  [repeats 3x]

harper you’re playing with our future you’re trying to sell our country out through
the pipeline.

harper you’ve got a revolution for trying to sell our country out through the pipeline.

Mama.

Use this link to watch the video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_bmo34Ma8TU&feature=plcp

The classic video produced by Shuswap Environmental Action Society that helped with the successful campaign that resulted in the creation of over 25,000 hectares of new provincial parks in the Shuswap watershed. “Shuswap Wild” combines breathtaking footage of Shuswap wilderness with slides by Myron Kozak and Marge Russell, interviews with Shuswap naturalist Mary Lou Tapsen-Jones and forest service ecologist Andre’ Arsenault, original music by Lindsay Kenyon and Hardie McIntosh and wildlife sounds into a powerful, moving 16-minute documentary.

The Upper Seymour River Provincial Park

The interviews and post-production editing were done by Michael Simpson and Fred Bird. Waterfalls, giant trees with hanging moss, canoes on a wilderness lakes, ferns and flowers, satellite photo and GIS map close-ups and scenes of clearcut devastation provoked and inspired viewers to help protect the Anstey Arm/Hunakwa Lake and Upper Seymour River Valley antique rainforest wilderness areas, that are now both provincial parks

The “Seymour Giant”

Court dismisses Neskonlith band appeal

By Martha Wickett – Salmon Arm Observer

September 24, 2012

An appeal launched by the Neskonlith Indian Band regarding the SmartCentres shopping development has been dismissed by the BC Court of Appeal.

In a decision rendered today at the Vancouver Law Courts, Madam Justice Newbury, Mr. Justice Hall and Madam Justice D. Smith agreed that arguments put forth by the Neskonlith were not sufficient to overturn a decision made in April by Justice Peter Leask in BC Supreme Court.

At that time, Justice Leask dismissed the Nesklonlith’s request for a judicial review. The band had argued that the City of Salmon Arm had a legal or constitutional obligation to consult with the band before issuing the environmentally hazardous areas development permit for the SmartCentres site. The site is adjacent to the Salmon River, which borders Neskonlith land to the west.

Leask concluded that the duty to consult, when decisions may affect aboriginal rights or title, rests with the province.

The band had argued that because the province had delegated some land-use decisions to municipalities with no oversight from the province, then the duty to consult also transfers to municipalities. Its argument included the concern that the property will flood, requiring flood control measures. Those flood-control measures would then do damage to the environment and the interests of the band.

Following the decision issued Monday, Sept. 24, a SmartCentres’ spokesperson told the Observer that next steps haven’t been decided yet.

In an email, Sandra Kaiser, vice-president of corporate affairs for SmartCentres, wrote: “Our lawyers are in the midst of digesting the decision to provide us with a fulsome understanding of the implications of the decision. Once this has happened we will consider the next steps regarding our site.”

Mayor Nancy Cooper said city council will be reviewing the decision with the city’s lawyers, but “it is positive for Salmon Arm and, indeed, for all local governments.”

She explained by saying that if the appeal had been upheld, it would have far-reaching ramifications.

“If it was the other way around, it would call into question any decision that any municipality or local government made.”

Nonetheless, Cooper said she is thinking about the Neskonlith band and hopes to be in touch with Chief Judy Wilson later this week.

“I will be contacting the Neskonlith band through their Chief Judy Wilson, just to see how we can move forward together.”

Wilson told the Observer the band is also discussing the decision with its lawyers and will be commenting on it later.

Named in the appeal were respondents the City of Salmon Arm and Salmon Arm Shopping Centres Inc. while the Union of BC Municipalities was granted intervenor status. The status was granted because the decision could potentially have had far-reaching effects for municipalities.

Justice Newbury addressed three questions in reaching her decision: 1) Was the City of Salmon Arm subject to the Crown’s duty to consult and, where appropriate, accommodate with respect to the issuance of the development permit? 2) Was the issuance of the permit conduct that might adversely affect the assumed aboriginal rights or title claims of the Neskonlith and 3) If the city was subject to a duty to consult, was that consultation adequate in this case?

She referred throughout her decision to a 2004 case involving the Haida Nation versus the BC Minister of Forests, as well as a 2010 case featuring Rio Tinto Alcan Inc. versus the Carrier Sekani Tribal Council. Among other things stated in the 38-page document, she wrote, with regard to the first question, that municipal governments lack the practical resources to consult and accommodate First Nations.

“It is precisely because the Crown asserted sovereignty over lands previously occupied by Aboriginal peoples that the Crown in right of the Province is now held to the duty to consult.”

She also wrote that it would be “completely impractical” for municipal governments to do so.

“Daily life would be seriously bogged down if consultation – including the required ‘strength of claim’ assessment – became necessary whenever a right or interest of a First Nation ‘might be’ affected.”

As to whether issuance of the permit might adversely affect the Neskonlith, she writes that the effect is “uncertain, indirect, and at the far end of the spectrum of adverse effects” mentioned in the Haida case.

She states that the Neskonlith’s expert on flooding makes a number of important assumptions: “That the development would experience flood conditions (which Shopping Centres says is doubtful given that it will be building only on the portion of the property that has been occupied in the past); that the flooding would be of such a level and of such duration that there would be an ‘imperative demand’ for flood protection; that the public authorities would respond to such demand; and that they would do so either by modifying the river channel or constructing a dike along the river and below the Highway #1 bridge. It is far from certain that all of these would come to pass.”

Regarding adequacy of consultation, Justice Newbury writes: “I conclude that the process in this case was reasonable; that the Neskonlith were fully and promptly informed of all the applications and amendments relevant to the permit and to the development generally; that they were given several opportunities to express their concerns; that their objections (and those of others) were taken seriously and did lead to material modifications of the planned development; and that the city’s decision itself lay within the range of reasonable outcomes.”

Read the court decision here:

http://www.courts.gov.bc.ca/jdb-txt/CA/12/03/2012BCCA0379.htm

Here is the conclusion to the decision:
[90]         The Neskonlith submit that “Even the lowest form of consultation demands substantive engagement and discussion” with the First Nations, and that that has not occurred in this case.  In the absence of any statute or case law that requires a particular form of consultation, I cannot agree.  I conclude that the process in this case was reasonable; that the Neskonlith were fully and promptly informed of all applications and amendments relevant to the permit and to the development generally; that they were given several opportunities to express their concerns; that their objections (and those of others) were taken seriously and did lead to material modifications of the planned development; and that the City’s decision itself lay within the range of reasonable outcomes.

Disposition

[91]         For all these reasons, I would dismiss the appeal.