Salt Spring’s agricultural community crowded Lions Hall to press officials for change, in the wake of a courtroom decision that went against one island couple whose poultry-breeding activities were found to have violated local noise bylaws.
Seating capacity at the town hall was reached and exceeded Monday, Sept. 9, and as members of Salt Spring’s Local Community Commission (LCC) listened, one islander after the next took the microphone largely to speak in favour of legal changes that could shield farming activities from neighbourhood complaints, irrespective of whether they were within Salt Spring’s Rural or Agriculture land-use zones.
The community gathering was called in response to a provincial court judge fining Salt Spring resident Clinton McNichol for contravening Capital Regional District (CRD) noise bylaws due to keeping roosters on his Rural-zoned Woodland Drive property. That judge also ordered a prohibition on any roosters being kept there until Sept. 6, 2025.
Addressing the LCC, Salt Spring Island Farmers Institute board of directors president Terry Clement and Agriculture Committee chair Kevin Chipperfield re-sounded that group’s alarm on the shrinking availability of farmland on the island, saying it seemed clear the local court case would ultimately have a wider reach.
“This action far extends beyond Salt Spring Island,” said Clement, “because what it does is, it impacts the food security and the food sovereignty right across the province.”
Clement said the Farmers Institute’s plan was to escalate its involvement, beginning with a suggested dispute resolution mechanism sent to the head of CRD’s bylaw enforcement and hopefully extending to input on new legislation in the longer term.
“With this as a precedent set in the court,” said Clement, “it means that any new nuisance, noise type of issue — regardless of whether it’s agriculture, or whether somebody is setting up a scrap metal [operation] that has been zoned industrial and it is a permitted activity — can be prevented and dismissed as a result of a nuisance bylaw issue.”
“If we cannot find common ground between small lot farmers and their neighbours, the situation could become untenable,” said Chipperfield, “with the legal profession as benefactors.”
That particular sort of common ground would have to wait for another night. As the LCC heard one speaker after another expressing the need for more permissive or protective bylaws for farming activities — or for unsympathetic neighbours to simply “deal with a little cock-a-doodle-doo,” as one attendee put it — the increasingly enthusiastic applause made it clear the gathering was dominated by farming advocates.
Noticeably absent was public comment from the “other side” of the debate, LCC member and CRD director Gary Holman noted, while expressing his disappointment that so many who spoke were unwilling to refrain from cheering for one another.
“So there were folks here who do have a different view than virtually everyone in this room, and they felt intimidated to express that view,” said Holman. “And I’m telling you that I feel honour-bound as an elected official to also listen to those views. I’m open to try to make changes to avoid this kind of circumstance in the future, but it’s going to be done by listening to everybody.”
Holman proposed convening a working group of all stakeholders to craft a way forward, but next steps meanwhile for those feeling a greater sense of urgency are less clear.
McNichol told supporters at the town hall there may yet be further legal appeals, although he noted he and spouse Alia Elaraj were left with “a very sizable debt and a ticking clock” to further contest the court decision.
McNichol’s neighbour Isy Cohen — one of the CRD’s court witnesses who complained about noise — addressed Salt Spring’s Local Trust Committee Thursday, Sept. 12, suggesting trustees consider changing the zoning for parcels on Woodland Drive bounded on two sides by Mobrae Avenue from rural “R” to residential R1-R5 or R8, which would prohibit intensive agriculture.
Salt Spring Island Poultry Club president Elsie Born submitted paperwork to speak before the Islands Trust Council during its next meeting set for Sept. 24 to 26. Born’s delegation request indicates she will bring several proposals, including policy revisions to protect farming practices on rural-zoned land.
And, at the tail end of the LCC’s regular meeting Thursday, Sept. 12, chair Earl Rook brought a notice of motion — “basically to get the conversation started, but not committing us necessarily to any particular course of action,” he noted — that the LCC initiate a review of both the noise and animal control bylaws, “for the purpose of assessing the suitability of existing bylaw language for the community of Salt Spring Island, and recommending changes where appropriate to the CRD Board.”
“The commissioners will work with staff to develop an open and transparent process,” Rook said, which would include “full public notification of the initiation of the review and the specific bylaws under review; public solicitation of input on the bylaws under review through multiple means, including written comments, public forums and meetings with stakeholders; and solicitation of legal opinion and guidance where necessary.”
Upon a reminder that the LCC lacks the authority to make recommendations directly to the CRD Board, commissioners at the Sept. 12 meeting seemed resigned to the protocol of making recommendations to Holman, who — in his role as CRD director — could bring recommendations to the CRD’s Electoral Areas Committee (EAC).
“Whatever the LCC recommends,” said Holman. “Even if I disagree with it, I will commit to making sure that the EAC sees that.”
That motion is likely to be made during the LCC’s meeting in October, Rook said.