Petition and Letter Writing Campaigns are Successful! 

A big THANK YOU to all who signed our petition and wrote to the Islands Trust asking for the new Trust Policy Statement (TPS) to prioritize protecting the natural environment. You made these campaigns a success.  

Our petition with 1,806 signatures, was sent to the Islands Trust, the Minister of Municipal Affairs, Christine Boyle and two green MLAs who represent islands in the Trust Area, MLA Rob Botterell, Saanich North and the Islands (who is supporting our position) and MLA Jeremy Valeriote, West Vancouver - Sea to Sky.   We will continue to ask for signatures until the a TPS is adopted. 

As of February 2nd, the Trust had posted 193 letters of which 134 favoured prioritizing protection of the natural environment.   Of the others, some represented special interests such as farmers or boaters or supported or had concerns about reconciliation. Five organizations sent comments including several island conservancies that generally called attention to protecting the natural environment. The letters can be read on the Islands Trust Website.

Reminder: the TPS is the document that controls development on the Trust islands.

We hope that the elected trustees will respond to this strong public sentiment and make needed changes to the draft TPS, such as defining the word “environment” to mean the “natural environment”, inserting stronger language to protect all natural ecosystems and not allowing new rights for development unless it is for legally protected affordable housing. 

We don’t know when the elected trustees, meeting together as Trust Council, will make a decision on the TPS.   But when this happens, we will let you know the outcome.  If they don’t respond positively, we will ask the Minister of Municipal Affairs, Christine Boyle, to reject the TPS and send it back for revisions.