In mid‐November, 1995, a member of the public observed a backhoe operator employed by a forest company carrying out pre‐winter road maintenance on a hauling road southwest of Campbell River, Vancouver Island. Waterbars and cross‐ditches were being constructed at a time when previous heavy precipitation had saturated the soils.
The complainant was concerned that, as a result of this work, silt was entering the Oyster River, causing damage to salmon eggs in the river gravel at that time of year. The complainant contacted a number of government agencies to express concern and subsequently filed a complaint with the Board on December 7, 1995.
A complaint was filed with the Board in August 1996 about the way ten forest development plans in the Port McNeill Forest District on northern Vancouver Island were advertised for public review and comment. The complainant requested that their name be kept confidential and the Board agreed to the request. The complainant was represented in all discussions by its agent, the Sierra Legal Defence Fund.
The complaint focused on the acceptability of the notice advertised in early 1996 by the licensee, International Forest Products, announcing that the plans were available for public review and comment. Shortly after the licensee placed the notice in the North Island Gazette, the complainant’s agent informed the district manager that the complainant considered the notice to be flawed because it did not include the name or phone number of a person to contact for further information, and included no information about alternative times and places for the public to review the plans.
In 1994, the Ministry of Forests Small Business Forest Enterprise Program (SBFEP) in the Sunshine Coast Forest District started planning to sell the right to harvest timber in a 26.8 hectare cutblock in a rural residential area near Homesite Creek on a peninsula between the communities of Secret Cove and Halfmoon Bay, approximately 20 kilometres from Sechelt.
Timber Sale A48267 was first described in the SBFEP’s 1994‐1998 forest development plan, and was shown in increasing detail on subsequent forest development plans for 1995‐1999, 1996‐2000 and 1997‐2001. The timber was originally scheduled to be logged in 1996.
The complaint related to the construction of a water pipeline right‐of‐way on Crown land near Mt. Currie in 1996. The right‐of‐way accessed two water licences on a stream. During periods of high water in the spring of 1996 and 1997 the complainant noticed that water was being diverted from the stream down the right‐of‐way onto a public road. The complainant asserted that this water flow was causing erosion damage to the road and introducing sediment into a nearby lake. The complaint also asserted that the damage to the road resulted in a situation potentially dangerous to vehicle traffic.
The complainant had contacted the Ministry of Forests (MoF) in September 1996 regarding the concerns about safety. The Ministry of Forests visited the site to investigate in May 1997. The MoF investigation found no substantive safety issues and no apparent issues of non‐compliance with any legislation. The complainant then filed a complaint with the Board in August 1997.
The District Manager of the Horsefly Forest District approved construction of a barbed wire fence under a grazing permit on June 5, 1995, immediately before the Forest Practices Code came into force. The fence was required to let 40 yearling cattle graze an area of Crown land near the Horsefly River and to restrict the period of such use to early summer. On June 17, 1995, the permittee cleared a right‐of‐way and installed a temporary electric fence.
After referral to other Crown agencies, the approval was modified with additional conditions in October, 1995. The District planned to complete a range use plan in mid‐1996 and the modified approval required that grazing in the area had to be addressed in he future plan.
