Quadra Island’s Community Plan was drawn up in 2007 and some of the Outer Discovery have land use plans dating back to the 1990s, but Area C needed an overall comprehensive vision. The Strathcona Regional District (SRD) started the consultation process leading to an Integrated Community Sustainability Plan in 2019. Then COVID arrived, and everything was put on hold. Last year the SRD recruited a community focus group, hired a facilitator and proceeded to finish the job. On Friday, June 16, The SRD Board announced the approval of the Integrated Community Sustainability Plan for Electoral Area C (The Discovery Islands & Mainland Inlets).
“Anytime we do any sort of comprehensive planning process, one of the biggest challenges that we have is finding common ground amongst all the disparate ideas, visions, goals and challenges of people living in different areas – and with being diverse people themselves. In this case because it is a vision for the entire region, it was much more important that we were able to come together, find that common ground and that shared vision. That required a lot of intense discussion and a lot of work together,” explained Meredith Starkey. SRD Manager of parks and planning.
“The success story is that we were able to come together and craft this plan that may not be perfect as far as how each individual person would have written it, but everyone is happy with, and that we can all carry this forward into the next phase of the planning process into official community plans and zoning bylaws and really implement it because it is something that is largely accepted, agreed upon and shared.”
“We structured this plan around five community systems, recognizing that they all build on each other. They are interconnected and they’re interdependent. So a change or an influence in one area has impacts on all of the others and vice versa.”
“The five structures are:
- Climate change and natural environment,
- Developed areas, housing and infrastructure,
- Community wellbeing and health,
- The economy and employment
- Governance and reconciliation.”
“We started with climate change and the natural environment. That’s where you get into the values of respect for the environment and wanting to protect the environment, but also ensure that we recognize that we have access to wild spaces in the community. We recognize that of course there’s resource management components in there.”
“So how we are organizing our built environment around where we are building population centres, where we are focusing commercial growth, where we are focusing industrial activity or resource extraction activity, that kind of thing.”
“Layered on top of that then is community wellbeing and health. That’s where you get into the personal, individual quality of life factors. Health being connected in our communities, aging in place and diversity and inclusiveness, cultural elements, all of that rolled into the community wellbeing.”
“Part and parcel with that is economy and employment. So again, getting into education and the local economy, tourism, resource based activities, all of that.”
“The final layer of the final system being governance and reconciliation, because of course all the systems across have a regulatory component. They have a collaboration component and a partnership component decision making in there and all participants up and down the authority spectrum.”
“So those are the five systems in a nutshell.”
CC: I would like to go into more detail. For example, what are the specific goals in terms of adapting for climate change?
MS: “This plan developed six goals for climate change and natural environments. I could read them to you if you’d like, but the page is in the document.”
“The goals here are more vision oriented, things like:
- to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and become a net carbon sink, and adapt to a hanging climate.
- To recognize, respect and steward the natural environment and wildlife as the foundation of our community in human health.
- To protect where necessary, restore the health of natural areas generally in particular sensitive ecosystems, wildlife habitats, endemic species, and areas of significance to communities minimizing encroachment into these areas.
- There’s an access goal that is to appreciate, protect, and enjoy community spaces to wild places and areas of significance to communities, and to avoid harm by restricting access for sensitive areas that may be damaged by recreational activities.”
- “The resources goal is ‘to manage natural resources sustainably, reducing our consumption of natural resources and energy, moving toward increasingly local sources of renewable energy and zero waste and protecting water sources.
- The last is material types, which is to select natural and local materials over synthetic substances as much as possible, and to manage synthetic substances as their emissions in ways that protect human wellbeing and ecosystem health.”
“These are very high level goal statements, and the intent then is that they would be codified or implemented through the objectives and policies of the official community plan, as well as within the zoning bylaw which is the regulatory document for land use.”
CC: You mentioned reducing Area C’s carbon emissions, but this is a very sparsely populated area. We should probably start with, is there an emissions problem in Area C?
MS: It’s not so much that any area has a problem , it’s more just recognizing that we all are part of the solution and so we all have a role to play. It’s not just about minimizing our individual emissions, but it’s more of a growth strategy. So now when we’re looking at the communities that live in those Outer Islands, how do we sustain and grow those communities to thrive in a way that supports climate change adaptation in the national environment?
CC: What do they have to say about housing?
MS: “The goal there is to enable affordable residential housing to meet diverse community needs in planned areas that avoid sprawl and negative impacts on natural areas and the rural character of area C, focusing on core areas as the preferred approach.”
“So it’s a mouthful, but ultimately what it’s looking for is affordable housing, but we want it to be focused in designated areas of growth rather than new communities that are sprawled out into the greenfield or undeveloped areas.”
CC: ‘Community wellbeing and individual health,’ what are some specifics for that?
MS: “There’s five goal areas that are within that system, that is:
- quality of life;
- character and culture;
- unique and connected;
- diversity and inclusion;
- and health and safety.”
“‘Quality of life’ is just this generic to support good health and quality of life for Area C community members. Pretty broad, but we all understand and it resonates.”
“‘Character and culture’ looks to preserving, protecting and celebrating both the Indigenous culture of the area and the rural nature of the community, as well as the history.”
“Unique and connected’ – to foster a strong sense of community, close social connections and collaboration, mutual understanding and respect for how we work together as a community.
“Diversity and inclusion’ – just being inclusive of all people, treating people with fairness, respecting care.”
“And then ‘health and safety’ is things like ensuring that people have access to those essential health services, emergency services – a challenge of course, both on Quadra and especially in the Discovery Islands.”
CC: Economy and employment?
MS: “This one has four goals within it. The role categories are:
- local goods, services and businesses,
- education and employment
- resource-based activities
- and tourism.”
“The first one there is supporting locally owned businesses in the area so they can thrive.”
“‘Education and employment’ is ensuring that there are local employment opportunities as well as educational opportunities, both for youth and for those transitioning to maybe new forms of employment.”
“‘Resource-based activities’ are still a large part of the economy on Quadra and throughout Area C. So being sure that we are managing those resource industries in a sustainable way, both for the environment and the jobs that they provide.”
“Then tourism, similarly, is a huge economic driver in Area C. So being sure we are managing tourism so that it supports small-scale, ecologically responsible tourism and reduces the adverse impact from other forms or any form of tourism.”
CC: The major industry used to be fish farms and logging, but now it’s just logging.
MS: “There’s still quite a bit of aquaculture, but we have seen a shift in the latest census that looks like there’s growing tourism and growing retail, education and health.”
CC: Actually I was incorrect. I was thinking of the industries that usually get fingers pointed at them. Tourism people have been telling me that they’re bigger than logging and they’re bigger than aquaculture in the Outer Discovery Islands. I don’t know about the Mainland Inlets.
MS: “I’m not sure about that, I’d have to check.”
CC: Can you talk a little more about government, reconciliation and First Nations. This seems to be getting more complex as First Nations come into being as the local government. I am thinking of Cortes, where there are at least two local governments: the SRD and Tla’amin FIrst Nation and the Klahoose First Nation will soon sign a treaty as well. There are similar situations within Area C.
MS: “Certainly as someone who works in government, that’s always something on our mind. The four goals that are within that system are:
- decision making,
- participation,
- reconciliation,
- and partnership.”
“In ‘decision making’ our goal there is to ensure that we’re really bringing in local voices and decision making, participation carries that forward. Ensuring that we are meaningfully and consistently engaging the community when decisions are made and building our plans in partnership.”
“Clearly there’s a lot of activity happening right now with regards to treaties, but even outside of that one of the goals that we have is to build better relationships with our area First Nations and to pursue a framework of reconciliation and then partnerships.”
“That, again, is just ensuring that when we are doing these planning exercises and projects in partnership because that’s what this is all about.”
“It’s not my job to tell Area C what makes sense for that community and so working together to make sure that we can actually bring these visions of the community to fruition is really what that’s about.”
“The thing that I would really like to say is just a really huge thank you to both the task force and the community at large for all of the input that they provided through this process.”
“The task force was a volunteer group, I think it was 14 people and they came and spent hours of their time, reading and reviewing materials and having conversations. So just really committed to being honest and open, not just with planning staff, but with each other in a really respectful collaborative way. This Integrated Community Sustainability Plan couldn’t have been completed without that.”
Top image credit: Owen Bay on Sonora Island – Photo courtesy SRD
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