Cortes Currents

Quadra Island considering opting-in to Short-Term Rental Accommodations Act

Roy L Hales/ Cortes Currents - The SRD Board will be meeting again today and three items about BC’s Short Term Rental Act are on the agenda. The Ministry of Housing responded to Cortes Island’s decision to opt in. 58% of the respondents of Area Câ€™s survey on whether to opt in replied ‘Yes’ and Area D will not opt in. 
 
On February 28, the SRD approved Cortes Island’s decision to opt in to BCâ€™s Short Term Rental Act. The Ministry of Housing responded to this in an email last week.
 
“The request to opt-in to the principal residence requirement will take effect November 1, 2024, to give hosts notice to comply. In the meantime, this spring the Province will be standing up a new STR Compliance and Enforcement unit to investigate, take enforcement action related to short-term rentals, and direct platforms to remove non-compliant listings.”

Vonesch was informed that the Ministry needs to receive a copy of the SRD resolution approving Cortes Islandâ€™s action by March 31, 2024.   

Cortes Island and ‘other interested local governments’ will be removed from the exempt land list this spring. 

“If the Province grants a change to exempt land status, that change remains in effect indefinitely unless a subsequent request to reverse the exemption is made by March 31 of a future year.”
In related news, on March 5 Regional Director Robyn Mawhinney of Area C   launched a survey to see if her constituents also want to opt in. 58% of the people who 405 repondants stated 'Yes' and  41% stated 'No.'

Area C has not announced a final decision and this matter will be discussed at today’s meeting. 

In the same staff report it states John Rice, Regional Director of Area D, the Director has chosen to not opt-in to the principal residence requirement but is looking for public input regarding the regulatory aspects of STRs within the zoning bylaw. This will be discussed at a later date in a separate report.

Corttes Currents

Short Term Rental Decisions for Electoral Areas B, C and D

Roy L Hales/Cortes Currents - Rick and Cheryl Schellinck have been trying to obtain approval to subdivide their Quadra Island property, as the first step towards development, since 2011. The most recent version of the proposed Gowland Harbour Views project consisted of twenty-two 2 hectare rural residential lots,  a 5 hectare Agricultural Land Reserve parcel, and two small Regional District Parks. Quadra Island residents were given a chance to state their opinions of the project at a public meeting on June 12. Then Schellinck’s application was defeated in an electoral Directors only vote at the July 24, SRD Board meeting. It failed to make it to the third reading.

Proposed Gowland Harbour Development Defeated

Roy L Hales/Cortes Currents - The Strathcona Regional District is considering a Grant in Aid policy which would funnel all applications through staff. According to Gerald Whalley, who has been a Regional Director since the SRD was formed in 2008, this is the third time the idea of a policy has come up. After an intense debate, the proposal has been forwarded to the Electoral Areas Services Committee and Municipal Services Committee for further discussion. 

Some of the main points of the proposed policy include:

Financial assistance will only be considered for registered, non-profit organizations that have an operational presence within the Strathcona Regional District.
Applicants must provide a current financial statement and budget for the year
the SRD will not fund core operating expenses, capital improvements to equipment, insurance, property taxes, or multi-year funding commitments  
The SRD will give priority to applications that do not exceed $5,000 and are from organizations that do not already receive funding from the SRD

Mayor Julie Colborne of Zeballos explained that in the past, “We found that it would alter many of the contributions that are already being made.  We just felt that some of the restrictions were too restrictive.” 

Regional Director Robyn Mawhinney of Area C agreed: “I just wanted to point out that the next item on the agenda is three requests for financial assistance from Electoral Area C,  and with this policy as is, none of these three very important and valid applications would be considered eligible.  That includes the Quadra Island Foundation's application for financial support because they are hiring a consultant to create a Vital Signs report for Quadra Island. Neither would liability insurance costs for the Quadra Island Conservancy, which maintains public land that is publicly accessible and is a highly used piece of land for outdoor recreation in our community for visitors and for residents, be covered. Lastly Quadra Island Concerts is asking for $1,000 to assist with administration insurance costs for bringing music to our community for the entire winter. I just want to point out that this policy would negate all three of those applications.”

Debate on Proposed Grant in Aid Policy Continues

Roy L Hales/Cortes Currents - It has been 85 years since the Truck Loggers Association was founded to give independent loggers a collective voice in society and the forest industry. Now they would like the Strathcona Regional District (SRD) to intervene on their behalf with BC’s Minister of Forests, Minister of State for Workforce Development and Chief Forester. This was disclosed during the discussion of a motion from the SRD’s Natural Resources Committee at the Wednesday December 11 Board Meeting. 

Regional Director Robyn Mawhinney said she is not a member of the Natural Resources Committee, but the issue is a concern to her. The Forestry Practises Board recently released a report that stated there was a deficit of old growth on Quadra Island and only about 1% of the trees were greater than 250 years old. Three companies were found to be out of compliance with some aspect of forest legislation. The reported added that “the bigger issue  is that no one is responsible for monitoring or ensuring that Quadra Island’s old forests are conserved, or that enough mature forests are protected from logging so that they can develop into old forest in the future.” 

Mawhinney had brought this matter to the SRD Board asking that “that the board write a letter to the Minister of Forests, the Minister of Water, Lands and Natural Resources, and BC's Chief Forester, highlighting concerns with old forest management on Quadra Island.” 

Instead the matter was referred to the SRD’s Natural Resources Committee, who responded with a very different motion of their own. Perusing the associated materials, Mawhinney realized,“ This motion was coming from the Truck Loggers Association.” 

Chief Administrative Officer David Leitch confirmed, “ Sure, this motion was crafted by the delegation, but it was supported by the committee. So this is a motion of the committee.”

The Natural Resources Committee is proposing that:
“WHEREAS Forestry works for communities in every corner of the province, from jobs to exports, to providing revenues for hospitals, schools and roads and communities;”
AND WHEREAS the future of forestry is at risk, with the closure of half of BC mills in the last two decades, and harvest levels falling to more than 40% below the annual allowable cut;
“AND WHEREAS a sustainable forest sector must have access to a reliable annual allowable cut to support the services and infrastructure British Columbians rely on to provide families with livable wages, and bring stability to the supply chain;”
“THEREFORE the Natural Resources Committee directs staff to send a letter to Minister Parmar, and Minister of State Mercier, and Chief Forester Shane Berg, requesting a meeting to discuss their meaningful commitment to delivering a stable, accessible and reliable annual cut.”
There was no reference to the Quadra Island backstory, when the Natural Resources Committee motion was introduced.
Instead CAO David Leitch said, “Mr. Chair, this is a motion from the Natural Resources Committee, so nothing more to add from staff.”
Regional Director, Gerald Whalley of Area A responded, “Just a question for staff here. The meeting, is that to involve the board or just that specific committee?”
CAO Leitch: “It’s unclear, you're right.”
Director Whalley: “I think it should involve the board, at least for those who are interested.” 


Political maneuvers_ SRD proposal to meet with the province about the allowable cut and other forestry matters

Roy L Hales/Cortes Currents - At their December 11 meeting, the Strathcona Regional District (SRD) Board passed a bylaw to regulate bulk water processing, bottling and sales on Maurelle, Sonora, Stuart, and the Rendezvous islands.

Three Campbell River Directors voted against receiving the staff report for this bylaw.

Director Susan Sinnott explained,  “I just want to hear from staff, the reasons necessary. Is there a pending application for people to bulk water in the distillation sound area? Is there an imminent issue?” 

Chief Administrative Officer David Leitch replied,  “The impetus of this. Bylaws came from the directors. So I think it's probably more appropriate for the director to speak to it.” 

Cortes Island Director Mark Vonesch pointed out,  “This is the same bylaw we already passed for Area D, Cortes and Quadra Islands.” 

Director Sinnott:  “Well, thank you, my recollection was there was concerns about water usage and aquifer protection.  I just wanted to know if this was similar. I don't know if there's an issue in the Desolation Sound area that's similar.” 

Robyn Mawhinney is the Regional Director for Area C, which includes Quadra, Maurelle, Sonora, Stuart, and the Rendezvous islands:

 “Although it says the Desolation Sound Rural Land Use Bylaw it's funnily enough, not in Desolation Sound. It's Read, Maurelle, Sonora, Stuart, and the Rendezvous Islands. If you look at the bylaws, it's really about providing an opportunity for community to have a public hearing If there is an application for a commercial water extraction enterprise.”  

 Director Sinnot: So raising my question again, are we regulating something that's not ever going to happen? I can't imagine there's ever going to be a person that wants to bulk water bottling or any type of extraction of a very remote area without ferry service. So one, I don't like the idea of regulating things if we don't have to, but second of all, we're intruding into an area outside our jurisdiction if it's about water preservation.”  

Director Mawhinney: “I would suggest that providing an opportunity for the community to have input on a commercial enterprise, which could drastically affect their drinking water is reasonable.  I think when you look at what happened in Merville, if you wait until an application  is coming forward it's too late.” 

The concern about bulk water extraction can be traced back to a Merville property owner’s idea to bottle and sell the water beneath his property. 

On March 8, 2023, two weeks before CVRD approved MacKenzie’s application, Regional Director Robyn Mawhinney asked the Strathcona Regional District (SRD) to report on the possibilities for limiting groundwater extraction within Area C. The District had just gone through the severest drought in Campbell River’s records and it was about to  go through the drought of 2023.

On September 25, 2024, the SRD passed bylaws prohibiting ‘bulk water sales, bulk water processing and bulk water bottling’ on any upland or foreshore area of Cortes or Quadra except where expressly permitted within a zone.

That was when Director Mawhinney then introduced what has erroneously been called the Desolation Sound Bulk Water Regulation.

Director Mawhinney: “ We've had a public hearing and the community was in support of it, as they have been for Area D, Area B (Cortes Island) and the Quadra island portion of Area C.” 


Bulk Water Regulations for the Outer Islands

Roy L Hales/Cortes Currents - Campbell River’s Strathcona Gardens is in the midst of re-development. Following a successful Alternative Approval Process (APP) in Campbell River and Area D, whose residents use this complex, in 2023 the Board authorized borrowing up to $64.6 million for this project. Crews are currently building the foundations. 

The SRD is exploring the possibility of using Area C property tax dollars to support this complex, but has not yet decided upon a course of action. This sparked a great deal of resistance from Area C residents who do not want to see their property taxes increased to pay for a ‘Campbell River’ project. 

In a motion made by Regional Director Robyn Mawhinney in November, she referred to hundreds of items of correspondence to that effect. The flow of correspondence continues. Emails and scanned letters from 65 Quadra residents, 2 Read Island residents and 1 Maurelle Island resident were received as correspondence at the January 22, 2025 SRD Board Meeting.

None of the 68 correspondents supported the project. One admitted to using the Strathcona Gardens approximately 4 times during her 40 years on Quadra Island.


Area C Taxpayers Resistant to paying for Strathcona Gardens Re-Development

Roy L Hales/ Cortes Currents - CityWest’s internet service for Cortes Island was cut off again, sometime after 10:44 on Saturday, March 8, and not restored until after 9:00 on Monday, March 10. This is the third or fourth time in the last 12 months. 

The outage did not affect CKTZ, which relies upon Mascon de TELUS, but did shut down numerous CityWest customers (including Cortes Currents).

‘Rumour’ has it that the fibre cable was cut somewhere on the underwater stretch between Denman Island and Williams Beach.  

“They require a special "marine team" to take care of it and it will be weather dependent. Hopefully the break will be near shore, but they may have to pull up the entire length of cable to find the break and fix it.”

One of CityWest’s public relations people confirmed there was a break in the cable, but could not say where. However the recorded announcement on their phone in line stated:

 “We are seeing services affected in Williams Beach, Stories Beach, Manson's Landing, Bold Point, Heriot Bay, Whaletown, Open Bay, Granite Bay, Chatham Point, Blink Channel, Bliss Landing, Seaford, Klahoose, and Gillies Bay.”

So the rumour was true, at least in regard to where the break occured. 

There are some questions about CityWest’s recorded announcement.

For starters, it says services are affected in Bold Point, Open Bay, Granite Bay and Heriot Bay - which are all Quadra Island locations.   

Only Regional Director Robyn Mawhinney, who lives on Quadra, has yet to hear of ANYONE being connected on Quadra Island and, up until this point, there has been no mention of Heriot Bay being served.  

A number of Cortes Island residents have been connected for over a year, but a lot of people have not. It is not clear which group is in the majority. 
In a previous post, Cortes Currents mentioned that numerous households in Squirrel Cove, Whaletown and Mansons Landing have yet to be connected. 

Since then, a source who wishes to remain anonyomous, claims that service has yet to be brought to Seaford Road.  

Don Hall, from Tiber Bay, recently stated there is no service in his area either. 

“We expressed interest early on to get hooked up. They used to phone us and they used to try to sell us things. They ran a line from our local road to our house, but they never ran the line from the main  fiber optic network into where we live at Tiber Bay. They never hooked up our house either. The last time I ever heard anything from them was three years ago when they scheduled an appointment to hook up the internal to our house. They never showed up for that and we never heard from them again.”

The Strathcona Regional District has not been talking about the connected coast project very much lately, but according to the press release on their website, this is “a joint venture between the Strathcona Regional District (SRD) and CityWest" which “will be managed and implemented by CityWest and the Strathcona Regional District.”

Disruptions of CityWest’s Services on Cortes and Quadra Islands

Roy L Hales/Cortes Currents - SRD staff will prepare a staff report identifying public lands on Quadra Island that may be available for affordable housing development.

This is the second time that Regional Director Robyn Mawhinney of Area C brought forward a motion asking for a report and in both cases she was opposed by Directors from Campbell River and Area D. They successfully blocked it at the August 20th SRD Board meeting, but an amended motion passed on September 17

In the unedited audio of the meeting that follows, Campbell River Director Robert Kerr stated the Director of Area C should have filed a notice of motion, rather than making a motion from the floor. Campbell River Director Susan Sinnott claimed the report will not accomplish what Quadra wants and said they do things differently in Campbell River.

Regional Director Robyn Mawhinney of Area C described her relationship with the  Discovery Islands Affordable Housing Society, a volunteer organization on Quadra Island. She is not being familiar with the way  Campbell River does housing projects, but the SRD has a regional housing service and it would be great if they could support an affordable housing project on Quadra Island. 

Cortes Island Director Mark Vonesch supported the motion, reminding the board that we are in a housing crisis and there is more than one way to get housing projects done.

The motion passed despite opposing votes from Campbell River DIrectors Chapman, Kerr and Sinnott, as well as Alternate Director Browne for Area D. 

SRD staff will be looking for public lands within a reasonable distance from the Village Centres of Heriot Bay and Quathiaski Cove.
 

SRD Staff to identify public lands on Quadra for potential affordadable housing sites

Roy L Hales/Cortes Currents - Campbell River wants to take control of the Strathcona Regional District’s Electoral Areas Planning Service away from rural directors. They are thinking of joining the service, which would cost Campbell River tax payers close to $500,000 a year for their resulting share of the assessments, and have asked other municipalities to do the same. This morning’s story consists of interviews with the Regional Directors of Areas A, Cortes Island and C, who issued a joint press release against this on Wednesday, October 1. 

Mark Vonesch, Regional Director of Cortes Island, began,  “For folks that are learning about this, for the first time, I'll give some background information. The four electoral areas at the Strathcona Regional District. That's Cortes Island, that's Quadra and the Discovery Islands, the Seaward Valley area, which is area A and then area D south of Campbell River. We currently have a planning service that we all pay into. That's where all our land use decisions happen and currently the four of us are the votes on those decisions. Campbell River has the right to be able to join this planning service, but it means they have to pay for it.”

“So right now, Campbell River is considering joining the electoral area planning service that would cost them $500,000 a year. That's $5 million over the next 10 years to be able to control land use planning decisions in the rural areas of the Strathcona Regional District.” 

Gerald Whalley, Regional Director for Area A explained, “My concern is based on the fact that if Campbell River joined the electoral area planning service, they would have total control over all land use issues within the rural areas, within the electoral areas. That is because Campbell River has five votes, the other electoral areas only have four votes, so they could potentially outvote us on every issue.”

Robyn Mawhinney, Regional director for Area C added, “This could mean that an application which has not received community support could be pushed through despite community feedback. It could potentially mean a building service could be implemented, costing residents not only increase tech, do tax dollars annually, but more and more fees for every stage of construction. It could really mean that the wishes of rural residents are not considered in land use planning decisions, and to me, that's unacceptable and why I am really so concerned with this proposal.”


Rural Directors against Municipalities joining the Electoral Areas Planning Service

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