Salt Spring’s elected officials are taking a hard look at delivering services to liveaboards in Ganges Harbour –– or, at a minimum, getting a better understanding of what services they already provide.
Local Community Commission (LCC) member Brian Webster brought a report to the group Thursday, Aug. 15 on his participation in an April workshop called Collaborative Action to Resolve Boat-Related Issues in the Capital Region, put on by the Capital Regional District’s (CRD) Environmental Protection Division.
For regional officials, that mouthful of a meeting linked the proliferation of mooring buoys to the growing number of derelict vessels within the CRD, and prompted directors to start considering whether a regional harbour service –– and tax –– might be warranted.
But on Salt Spring, Webster argued, local government is already providing services for people who live on moored vessels, particularly in Ganges –– and might do more. Webster noted the CRD, through services delegated to the LCC, already provides some services to those living on the water in Ganges Harbour –– although indirectly, through the Parks and Recreation service. Webster pointed to the washroom and water fountain at Centennial Park, which are available to anyone, including liveaboard residents who come ashore.
“We have a dock for small boats for people who go back and forth,” he said, referring to the Rotary dock, “and despite some claims on social media, we also have garbage facilities –– although limited and less at some times of year than others –– in Rotary and Centennial parks.”
Webster proposed the LCC assess whether those services would be “more appropriately” funded through the commission’s relatively unknown Small Craft Harbour Facilities Service, one of several brought under LCC jurisdiction when it was established in 2023. That service is most commonly called the “Fernwood Dock Service,” referring to the 400-foot no-services transient dock on the northeast side of Salt Spring Island.
“For whatever reason, we’ve quite carefully constrained it to only talk about the Fernwood Dock,” said Webster. “But in fact, service potentially could go way beyond that.”
Indeed, while the establishment bylaw for the Small Craft Harbour Facilities Service sets a maximum annual requisition of 5 cents per $1,000 property value tax rate –– or $162,800, whichever is greater –– the service in recent years has reflected a fraction of that cost, with $53,000 set aside in the CRD’s 2023 final Salt Spring Island Electoral Area Capital Plan.
And, Webster argued, even without increasing the tax burden, allocating dollars appropriately is better governance; he told commissioners he would likely argue at a minimum for shifting some funds from Parks and Recreation to the Small Craft Harbour Facilities Service –– “putting more dollars in that budget so it can actually contribute toward the services Parks and Rec were already providing.”
Webster gave notice he would be making a motion to get discussion of the topic onto the agenda for a future meeting, likely in October.
“We need to talk about it and see if we can find some kind of consensus –– because if we don’t, the CRD machine is going to just roll on,” said Webster. “We are the CRD, but we are CRD Salt Spring; if we want to make sure that our community’s needs and priorities are fully accounted for, we need to have conversations about it.”