March 15, 2003

Hi folks,

Please Support Bill 239

 

Values that some property owners in the Kawartha Highlands have been fighting hard to protect for the last five years, and obsessively for the last two years,  are: 

i) Free Use Policy Privileges and 

ii) property access rights. 

This area is now generally referred to as the Kawartha Highlands Signature Site (KHSS). 

 

Free Use Policy privileges allow Ontarians the unencumbered use of Crown land controlled under the Public Lands Act (PLA) for purposes of general recreation (trails, camping, canoeing, hunting, fishing, camping, etc.).  These traditional privileges are marvelous advantages accruing to Ontarians and they should not be compromised unless absolutely necessary. Section 28 of the PLA provides ample provision for controls to prevent abuses on an - affordable, site-specific, when, where and as required basis.

 

Property access rights/privileges include roads, trails and utility corridors.

 

Both of these values are seriously compromised for properties surrounded by Crown land having a Provincial Park designation.  This would be the outcome if the recommendations of the politically appointed Local Stakeholders' (advisory) Committee (LSC) were implemented. The LSC has demonstrated almost no regard for about 2,000 private property owners in the KHSS area.  Incidentally, as far as we know, none of the LOCAL Stakeholders Committee members owns property within or contiguous with the proposed KHSS boundary???

 

In order to mitigate concerns in this regard an intensive campaign was started on August 25th, 2001 to stop the park designation from being made right to property lot lines. "Buffer zones" were requested between private properties and any portion of the KHSS to be designated a Provincial Park. Free Use Policy Privileges and property access rights would be preserved for adjacent property owners in these buffer zones.

 

The so-called Local Stakeholders' Committee (LSC) refused to recommend buffer zones for some properties in the KHSS, but did recommend them for others. The rationale of the LSC made no sense to those who were denied the "buffer zones", since they had requested them for the same reasons as those property owners who received them.

 

Persons working on this problem were successful in getting both municipal councils in the area, and all cottager and ratepayer associations in the area, except one, (about twenty groups in total) to request buffer zones.  The one exception was the Catchacoma Cottagers' Association (CCA).  The CCA executive has behaved very irregularly with regard to KHSS issues.

 

On December 12th, 2002,  property owners scored a big win - the Minister of Natural Resources introduced Bill 239 which would make the KHSS a Recreation Reserve (RR), the first  time this progressive land use designation would be used. Theoretically it could provide the safeguards that motivated the requests for buffer zones. 

 

Section 4, which states the proposed Recreation Reserve would be controlled under the Public Lands Act, would protect the Free Use Policy Privileges.  The intent of Section 7 is to preserve whatever access rights/privileges (roads, trails and utility corridors) we had prior to the Lands for Life and Ontario's Living Legacy initiatives (i.e. prior to 1997).   Section 5(3) provides for "utilization zones" which can provide even more control, if required, than Section 28 of the PLA, which is provided for in Bill 239, Section 5(4).  In fact, utilization zones could be used, on a site-specific basis, to provide controls that are essentially identical to controls imposed in provincial parks. But property rights need not be compromised and the impact on Free Use Policy Privileges could be minimized using this mechanism.

 

Bill 239 (the RRA) was a huge surprise to all concerned, and a very pleasant surprise to some local property owners.  Finally someone, Minister Ouellette, was listening to the vast majority of local property owners (and their representatives) who are without doubt the most affected stakeholders.

 

The Bill is not perfect but improvements can be incorporated into it.

 

Unfortunately, members of the politically appointed LSC became upset because their  recommendations were rejected. Since December 12th  its members have been stirring up radical environmental groups,  some Liberals and some NDPers, to try to force Bill 239 to be withdrawn. 

 

These groups/persons, for example, have informed the public that Bill 239 has converted a "wildlife sanctuary" into "the largest hunt camp in Ontario south of Algonquin Park" - a preposterous falsehood. In fact, Bill 239 does nothing to significantly alter or enhance the opportunities for hunters.  These radicals, including some LSC members, are trying to reduce the important environmental and property rights issues at stake to the level of petty, partisan, pre-election politics.

 

The KHSS area was never planned to be a wildlife sanctuary.  All LSC members know, or ought to know, this fact.  Of course, you can imagine the reaction of some RADICAL environmentalist groups to this outrageous claim.  What should have been a rational, win-win discussion focusing on property rights and environmental issues has become an overly emotional attack on hunters, snowmobilers, other outdoor recreationists,  Minister Ouellette and about 2,000 private property owners.

 

The most significant aspect of Bill 239 is that it preserves property rights and Free Use Policy Privileges to a degree.  Every person who owns property, or believes in property rights, should sign it.  The recommendations of the LSC would confiscate property rights/and privileges on a grand scale. 

 

For example, about 200 properties, the last 10% of the roughly 2000 properties in the area, might never be able to get a road.  Eleven properties, including eight on the former Ketchecum Hunt Club property on Lake Catchacoma, might not even be able to get hydro. This would suddenly and most unfairly curtail the opportunities for property owners to even apply to build a road, which was clearly a permitted right/privilege when the subject properties were purchased from the Crown.

 

To counteract the actions of the "RADICAL environmental groups" and the LSC, a group known as The Stakeholders Groups of the Kawartha Highlands (SGKH), supported by many, has launched a petition to promote and support Bill 239.

 

I am asking you to support our attempt to protect important traditional rights and privileges that the LSC is recommending should be needlessly confiscated.  Please sign the petition, separately of course if you're married, and get as many of your friends, relatives, bridge partners or whatever to express their support for this very important issue. 

 

Please review the copy of Bill 239 attached and check out the petition website at

 

http://www.petitiononline.com/mod_perl/signed.cgi?Bill239

 

Please help us out on this one. Email  me at: whitesands@primus.ca if you desire more information.

 

By the way, I learned a new maxim the other day:

 

 "If your government is big enough to give you everything you want, then it's big enough to take away everything you have."

 

Where it reads “Ministry of Government Services Act” in Section 9 of Bill 239, read "expropriation", and this seems brutally frank. However, the reality is that this possibility is also provided for in the Provincial Parks Act (indirectly).  In fact, it applies anywhere the government decides to exercise the option, so Bill 239 does not change our status in this regard.

 

Regards,

Gary Faulkner