The universally hated Sumas Mountain gravel quarry application is one step closer to being approved, despite extreme opposition from virtually all local residents, the FVRD, the city of Abbotsford, Metro Vancouver, the FVMBA, naturalists, and many others.
First, some background. The controversial proposal dates back to 2011. Many articles have been written on it, here are seven:
City opposed to questionable quarry (Abby news, 2011)
Sumas quarry would be all tricks, no treats (Abby news, 2015)
Quarry would lead to 4,000 truck trips per year (Abby news, 2017)
Fraser Valley Quarry Proposal, A Stagnant Debate (News Activist, 2017)
Do We Need The New Quarry? (Ensign, 2017)
Hungry Companies Zero In On Sumas Mountain (The Valley Voice, 2011)
Quarry next to regional park could hurt environment, recreation (CBC, 2017)
Our friend Mark Rushton wrote letters of opposition, you can read two of them: here and here. TM Sandulak of SMRPOA wrote this excellent letter. The City of Abbotsford produced several reports on the proposal, one in 2011, one in 2012, and another in 2015.
The land in question is a gorgeous swath of Crown land close to the summit of Sumas Mountain --- it offers stunning views of the lower mainland and the Fraser River, and borders on the Sumas Mountain interregional park. If it were the site of a real estate development, it would be incredibly valuable. Rich people would live there. So surely it would be crazy to make it into a gravel pit, wouldn't it?
The original applicant is 266531 BC LTD, represented by Dave Taylor. We don't know Dave, but we doubt he's crazy. After all, Dave has been involved in other brilliant gravel quarry applications, like the one to turn Maple Ridge's stunning Blue Mountain into an open-pit eyesore. Blue Mountain is a premium location for executive-style real estate development, recreation, and wildlife, so local residents thought it was literally insane to turn the mountain into a gravel pit (A quarry on Blue Mountain, Are You Insane?)
Or how about Dave's other application, the one to make a gravel pit above Okanagan Lake. This one could be his masterpiece. The pit would sit between La Casa Resort, a provincial park, and an environmentally protected area. Plus, it would have a stunning view of Okanagan Lake. If we didn't know better, we'd think this would be the perfect location for an executive-style real estate development. Like Blue Mountain. Like Sumas Mountain.
But maybe Dave just submits these crazy gravel pit applications as pranks. Or, maybe he is serious. Could he be hoping that, one day, the gravel-mine lease could turn into a real estate windfall? The only way that could happen would be if the Crown were crazy enough to transfer ownership of the land to Dave's group, but they would never do that, would they?
It turns out Dave's Blue Mountain gravel-pit application was a joint venture with the Katzie native band, (the Katzie's traditional territory includes the area around Blue Mountain).
And it turns out that Dave's Okanagan gravel-pit was also a joint venture, this one with the Westbank First Nation.
And although Dave's Sumas Mountain gravel-pit application was not a joint venture with the local Sumas Nation, he approached the band several times to support it. So far, they have said they are opposed. We stand with our friends and neighbours of the Sumas Nation in their refusal to join such a poorly thought out and destructive proposal.
But consider this. Most of the land in BC (about 94% of the province) is claimed by about 200 different native groups, and as a result, the courts have determined that all Crown land could potentially be up for grabs. Sumas Mountain is part of the area associated with the local Sumas band and is claimed as their traditional territory. In order to address the land claims mess, the provincial government has begun doing complicated land swaps where Crown land is transferred to native groups to settle title disputes, sometimes in highly lopsided deals like this one, which left local residents dumbfounded. Here's another beauty, and another. The deals may seem totally unbalanced, but they are driven more by politics than economics. In some cases, the provincial government is just unilaterally (and somewhat secretly) handing over massive chunks of Crown land, like in this case. These sorts of deals are likely to continue for decades, as provincial resources get turned over to various bands. It is conceivable that, by partnering with native bands on gravel pit leases, speculators like Dave could find a way to profit from multi-billion dollar Crown land deals where thousands of acres of land suddenly become open to development.
But here's the good news. It was reported that the Katzie's withdrew their support for the Blue Mountain application. Perhaps they didn’t like the local opposition. We applaud and support the Katzie's withdrawal. It was also reported that the Okanagan Lake gravel pit application was abandoned in the face of organized efforts by local property owners (here are three of their excellent opposition letters: here, here, and here). Great news for Okanagan Westbank residents. So there is hope that, if we remain strongly (and vocally) opposed to the Sumas Mountain pit, it will not go ahead.
