Gabriola Discussion Guide - Climate Change

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GABRIOLA 
OFFICIAL COMMUNITY 
PLAN REVIEW
CLIMATE CHANGE
Discussion Guides
What is a Discussion Guide? 
The Gabriola Island Local Trust Committee is updating the Official Community Plan (OCP) — which guides 
development to align with the community’s vision and values on a variety of topics. This guide is designed 
to provide community members with background needed to provide feedback on policy options related to 
climate change.
Climate change is a primary lens influencing policy development throughout the Official Community Plan and 
Land Use Bylaw updates. As such, the engagement process has been designed in a way that promotes climate 
change as a point of discussion in all topic areas.
Share your thoughts through focus groups, direct communication with the Local Trust Committee and the 
Gabriola OCP Review Topic-Focused Engagement online survey (December, 2024 - April, 2025).
What is an Official Community Plan 
(OCP) for Gabriola Island?
The OCP implements the community’s vision.
It provides a long-term strategy for land use management, outlining broad objectives and policies to guide 
future growth and development of the community.
The OCP must align with higher level policies.
These include the Local Government Act, the Islands Trust Act, and the Islands Trust Policy Statement. This 
ensures that local plans are consistent with regional and provincial directives.

Exploring Climate Change
Given climate change is a lens through which to view all policy options, realistic climate change targets, 
policies and actions should be considered.
Existing climate change targets for Gabriola are not realistic in the face of a growing population, and are 
hard to measure. More realistic targets for the OCP could focus on specific areas where the Islands Trust and 
Local Trust Committee have some level of influence such as: increasing land designated for conservation and 
increasing residential density within walking distance of the village core. 
The bulk of actions and policies should be directly related to what the Local Trust Committee has jurisdiction 
over. Education and advocacy actions should be limited and reflect what is achievable by the LTC or Islands 
Trust Council. 
The Climate 12-12-12 project is an excellent local source of information relating to climate change impacts and 
actions that can be taken at the community level to address climate change. 
What we Heard
Much of the feedback received through the Gabriola Visioning 2050 process identified concerns related to 
climate change. Most community members engaging with that process and discussions related to principles 
and goals understand climate change as a clear reality that will impact the future of Gabriola’s ecosystems 
and community. There were many responses related to the need to adapt to potential impacts such as fire and 
drought. 
For details on community visioning and resulting goals and principle see: https://islandstrust.bc.ca/document/
gabriola-visioning-2050-what-we-h

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