By JASON MOGUS

I was disappointed to read our MLA Rob Botterell’s recent public statements opposing the Trust Policy Statement our current council is trying to move forward.

Mr. Botterell should remember he was elected to represent our whole economically and culturally diverse island, not just those in the traditional Green party base who have hardened around housing issues. 

Botterell’s criticisms of the Trust Policy Statement don’t hold water. He argues the current council shouldn’t dare move this process forward until another election, yet we’ve been watching this debate for two terms and almost seven years already. Laura Patrick was elected, twice, on a mandate that included housing and environment. The other Salt Spring trustee received the second most votes on a strong housing mandate, and many of the other 26 trustees across the Islands Trust area were also elected on strong housing mandates. It is not anti-democratic for our elected leaders to act on the orders the community gave them. 

What is more concerning is Botterell’s incendiary suggestion that the real reason an evolution to the Trust’s goals is being discussed is to unleash growth and development. “For those seeking urban amenities and growth, Salt Spring and the other islands in the Trust are the wrong places to live.” This tired argument gains clicks but lacks evidence. It dismisses both the data showing a third of this community is housing insecure, and the stories of countless working class and young people who struggle to stay in our increasingly unaffordable community.  

Botterell’s argument is suspiciously aligned with that of a small but vigorous group who have decided any attempts at dealing with our community’s housing crisis, no matter how incremental or responsible they are, is tantamount to treason of the founding principles of the Trust. 

I’ve been in rooms with dozens of islanders who care about making a difference on this issue that impacts us all. While there are varying degrees of agreement around what we should do, all agree we have to move forward, and that those with different views are acting in good faith.

Our MLA has had a full year on the job now. He should listen to a more diverse group of people before taking extreme positions that further erode trust in our institutions and needlessly divide our community.

The writer is a Salt Spring resident who works on campaigns for climate justice and housing around the world.

At a time in life when personal connections can seem vanishing, it’s all the more tragic our treasured elders are urged to be suspicious of new ones.

The message delivered from our visiting B.C. Seniors Advocate Dan Levitt may not have meant to be dispiriting, but there was a sad acknowledgement underpinning his excellent advice at the Salt Spring Seniors Centre last week: times have changed, and we need to keep up with them — even on Salt Spring.

The dramatic increase in calls to the province-wide Seniors Abuse and Information Line, or the rise in reported scams targeting senior victims, represent an industrialization of what once might’ve been a boutique area of criminal operation. With so much personal data being shared online, savvy scam artists have upscaled their efforts to direct fraud toward the most vulnerable with unprecedented precision — and with technologies that can now mimic the voices of loved ones, both seniors and those who care for them have to be vigilant.

It’s one thing to agree to take on the hard work of shifting our old habits; it’s quite another to recognize the downstream effects of making those now-necessary changes. Not picking up unknown phone calls, for example, or even being wary if they look familiar — because even an island prefix can be faked, Levitt confirmed — leaves many older residents mourning a lost opportunity for conversations, particularly as it becomes more difficult to get out and about to have them. It’s a complicated truth that a rise in these types of scams makes socially connecting programs offered for seniors — many supported by our own Salt Spring Seniors Services Society — all the more important.

Perhaps our local governments should also take a page from Levitt’s book of recommendations and begin work on a Seniors Plan — acknowledging this growing demographic’s needs before they reach crisis levels, and setting aside resources to meet reality. Because we will all be someone’s elder, sooner or later.

Let me be brutally honest. I have the worst sense of direction on the planet. Had I been born a few centuries ago and sailed with Columbus, I probably would have fallen off the edge of the earth. Had I been dogsledding with Robert Peary and searching for the North Pole, there’s no doubt in my mind that I would have been stranded together with a flock of penguins on a floating iceberg just off the shores of Antarctica. Had I been leading the Franklin expedition in the quest for a northwest passage that cut across the continent, I would probably have ended up bogged down in an endless lineup at Disneyworld.

It’s sad, I know, but I have a hard time knowing my left from my right, east from west and north from south. If it wasn’t for gravity, I probably wouldn’t be able to distinguish up from down. They say that there is no up and down in space, so maybe the life of an astronaut should have been my career choice. Unfortunately, any vital instruction telling me to turn left at Jupiter would jumble up any possible intergalactic travel plans for me.

Possibly even more challenging than trying to navigate the Northwest Passage are excursions to the local supermarket. Directions as to where I can find a package of Bob’s Red Mill organic ground flax are just as likely to send me and my shopping cart off into deep space as to the proper location in aisle 7B. Precise verbal directions and hand signals from supermarket staff employees may prove helpful to normal shoppers, but knowing the aisle and shelf numbers always seems to plop me directly facing the canned persimmons display rack. Being informed that a certain specialty item can be located two aisles over on the bottom shelf between the lactose free sour cream and the triple cream Greek yogurt may pinpoint the exact location to other shoppers, but is more than likely to deposit me smack-dab in the pet food section right in front of the doggie rawhide chewy bones. Most discouraging is the feeling I get after I have passed the bulk chocolate-covered jujubes five times and made a mental note to myself to finally pick them up on my last sweep through the aisles. Inevitably, I then forget which bin they are in, which results in my having to scan every container in the bulk food row. Almost as frustrating is leaving my buggy in one of the aisles so that I can quickly sprint over to pick up a forgotten grocery item in another location in the store, and then not be able to locate and retrieve the shopping cart no matter how much I search.

I have discovered, however, that all is not hopeless when it comes to having a rotten sense of direction. There are proven tactics and exercises that can increase the chances of not getting lost. The first and most important one is to ask directions. If you are of the male gender, you will never stoop to this strategy, so you might as well move right on to the next most important maneuver: using clues in your surroundings to assist in helping you find your way. You might recall that in the fairy tale Hansel and Gretel, the siblings dropped breadcrumbs as they wandered through the forest so they could later retrace their steps and find their way back home. It’s a pity that the crumbs were devoured by the forest wildlife, which is why the children ended up on the menu at the evil witch’s cake and sugar house. But hey, at least they had a plan. Other techniques for finding the way back home include tying one end of a large ball of yarn to your starting point, unrolling the ball until you reach the destination, and then rolling it back up as you follow the line of yarn back to where you started. This method is guaranteed to work unless any living being or machine happens to cross the line of yarn and accidentally or purposely breaks it.

Perhaps the most annoying challenge to navigating your way between here and there is the roundabout or traffic circle. Once considered an innovative engineering tool for integrating traffic flow, this monstrosity of misunderstanding and misdirection completely confuses both competent drivers and those who have zero sense of direction. As a result, either all traffic stops because nobody knows who actually has the right of way, or all traffic continues to go around in circles because nobody knows when it is their turn to exit the circle. If, by some miracle, you do manage to disengage from this merry-go-round of disoriented vehicles, you can be certain that the exit you took was not the one you wanted.

Speaking of confused directions, Salt Spring Island is possibly the Mecca of lost steps and unintentional backtracks. So many establishments and businesses have changed locations over the years that directions as to how to find these have to describe not only where they are presently, but also where they may once have been located. An example of such a direction could be something like “turn left at where the Video Ranch used to be before they moved into Grace Point and then head up the hill to the old hospital right across from what was once the cop shop.”

If you’ve lived on the island long enough, you may still remember how to find your way to the Vesuvius Inn or the Fulford Inn, although neither of these still exist. Long gone as well is the dark bar at the back of the Harbour House which was affectionately known as the Dungeon (or was it the Pit?). Any list of business past incarnations would have to include the credit union, which bounced around the downtown core so many times that you can still find old deposit slips blowing along the sidewalk and lining the shores of Ganges Creek.

Nobody asked me, but I’ve learned that it’s still possible to find my way around this island even if my sense of direction is beyond atrocious. The GPS app in my dashboard ought to be a great help if only I could locate its location on the instrument panel. Oh well, a little perseverance and a lot of luck wouldn’t hurt, especially since I can’t often track down my vehicle because I can’t find the actual parking lot where I last left it. Worst of all, however, are situations like the time I drove onto the ferry and walked off. Now that’s beyond beyond atrocious. That would have been the perfect time to jump off the edge of the earth.

By ETHAN WILDING

In its decision last week, the Supreme Court of British Columbia dismissed a judicial review challenging the Islands Trust’s rejection of the Baker Beach nature-based shoreline protection proposal.

The implication is troubling: that professionally designed, peer-reviewed solutions — supported by both the province and Fisheries and Oceans Canada — are being treated as unacceptable responses to shoreline erosion in the Gulf Islands.  Yet shoreline loss continues, driven by climate change, and the responsibility to adapt accordingly has not disappeared. This leaves homeowners in an untenable position, even as the Islands Trust itself acknowledges that property owners must have access to feasible, science-based means of protecting their homes.

So how did we arrive at this point, where acknowledged needs and approved science lead nowhere? Quite simply, through a breakdown in fair and predictable process. Although the court dismissed our judicial petition, the decision itself is sharply critical of how the Islands Trust handled our application. The judge found the Trust’s process so problematic that he took the extraordinary step of denying them costs. This means the Trust must absorb its own legal expenses as a direct consequence of its mismanagement here.

It did not have to unfold this way. When we entered the Islands Trust development permit application process, we did so deliberately and in good faith. We sought early meetings, followed staff guidance, and invested heavily in professional advice and technical work. We did this not because we expected special treatment, but because we understood the system to be rules-based. The premise was simple: if you understand the bylaws, meet them, and do the work required, the process should be predictable.

That premise failed.

For much of the application period, there was no indication that our proposal was anything other than compliant. We coordinated parallel reviews with federal and provincial agencies, assuming that land-use confirmation by the Trust was a necessary first step and not a discretionary hurdle that could change without warning. At no point were we advised early on that the application was considered defective, or that policies applicable to the nature of the development permit would not be met.

Then, without any clear explanation, the ground moved. Criteria appeared to change. Standards were applied differently than before. Communication slowed, then stopped. We were left trying to understand how a project that aligned with the Trust’s own stated objectives could suddenly be deemed unacceptable, without a clear or consistent rationale.

The court took explicit note of this. Justice Milman found that the Islands Trust should have communicated and raised fundamental concerns at the outset, rather than allowing the process to unfold over many months without clarity. As he wrote:

“The petitioners should have been told early on that the [Islands Trust] considered the applications to be defective . . . After submitting the original application on Dec. 27, 2023, the petitioners had to wait until May 2025, nearly 18 months, for a decision that was forthcoming only after an application was made to this court to compel an answer.”

The concerns did not end there. Justice Milman went on to observe that even when a decision was finally issued, the Trust failed to address key issues directly:

“The record before me indicates that the [Islands Trust] failed at any stage to address important issues squarely, such as the claim for an exemption based on the DFO letter or the question of how the opinion expressed in that letter could be reconciled with the [Trust’s] own conclusions as to the anticipated impact of the project on fish habitat.”

That finding bears emphasis. Throughout the entire process, the Islands Trust never engaged with us to discuss how the proposal might be adapted to address concerns, despite repeated requests for dialogue. At no point were we given the opportunity to modify the project in response to objections or evolving issues expressed by members of the public. Instead, after 18 months, our first and only indication of any deficiencies with our application came in the form of an outright rejection. Core questions were left unresolved, conflicting evidence was not meaningfully reconciled, and we were left without clear explanations for how conclusions were reached. This is not a minor procedural flaw; it strikes at the heart of administrative fairness.

Justice Milman acknowledged the consequences of this failure, noting that “all of this made the process, including the court process, more costly for the petitioners than it should have been.”

But the true cost extends well beyond legal fees. Consider the broader resources consumed: multiple technical and environmental reports, coordination across federal and provincial agencies, staff time across multiple departments, and litigation that could have been avoided entirely with competent administration. All of this for a privately funded project proposing nature-based shoreline protection, aligned with the Islands Trust’s stated goals.

There was another cost as well: opportunity. The fact is that shoreline erosion is an ever-escalating challenge in the Gulf Islands. Our generation, and future generations, will need to contend with this reality. But rather than working with us to develop an appropriate, science-based response, the Islands Trust declined to engage this project outright, missing an opportunity to provide leadership at a moment when clarity is urgently needed. A collaborative process could have helped implement a region-appropriate shoreline protection measure, one that could be evaluated and applied responsibly across our island and beyond. Instead, what could have served as a constructive example of how climate adaptation and clear land-use governance can coexist became a case study in procedural breakdown.

The broader concern here is the risk this case poses for projects going forward. Under British Columbia’s Local Government Act, development permit processes are meant to be predictable when established guidelines are met. If staff positions can be reversed without explanation, if timelines extend well beyond what applicants are told to expect, and if bylaw compliance no longer offers predictability, then the message to the community is clear: proceed at your own risk. That discourages exactly the kind of careful, responsible and environmentally conscious projects that the Islands Trust says it wants to see.

If there is a constructive path forward, it lies in reforming the process itself. The Islands Trust must recommit to a genuinely rules-based system, one where concerns are raised early, standards are applied consistently and applicants can rely on published bylaws rather than shifting interpretations. Clear timelines, transparent reasoning and respect for jurisdictional boundaries are not optional extras; they are the foundation of credible land-use governance. Without those reforms, future applicants will face the same uncertainty and the Trust risks undermining both public confidence and its own policy objectives.

The writer and Salt Spring Island resident is one of three petitioners in a recently dismissed B.C. Supreme Court case against the Salt Spring Island Local Trust Committee.