2024-06-18 Ronald Wright - Keep Salt Spring Sustainable

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As requested, further to Ronald Wright's application to speak as a delegation at the Trust 
Council Quarterly Meeting June 18-20, 2024, here is the draft presentation for the Trust 
Executive Committee's information on Wednesday June 5th. 
 
Chair Luckham and members of Trust Council: 
I'm here to speak for Keep Salt Spring Sustainable (KSSS), a group of 
residents working to uphold our island’s environmental well-being and rural character, as 
protected by the Islands Trust Object, the existing Trust Policy Statement (TPS), and Salt 
Spring's Official Community Plan (OCP). 
We have concerns about the content and process of recent draft revisions to the Trust 
Policy Statement, above all the proposed new interpretation of the Trust Act's core 
wording on the Trust Area's "unique amenities and environment." In Council's statement 
of Sept.26th 2023, these are now claimed to be "broad-ranging and may include issues 
such as, but not limited to, housing, livelihoods, infrastructure and tourism."  
Council's similar statement posted on January 18th declares: "The current Governance 
Committee, appointed in December, 2022, decided that it was a priority to review the 
mandate and report back to Trust Council on that review. Today’s presentation 
summarized and clarified all previous legal opinions."   
 
We are puzzled that the said opinions and "clarifications" do not mention the Trust 
Council Position Paper No.1, published and given Ministerial approval in 1986, which 
lays out at length, with many examples, how the wording of the Act's "Object" (or 
mandate) should be interpreted. In 2021, a new Discussion Paper reminded Trust Council 
of the 1986 paper's importance, noting it "provided explicit, detailed interpretations of the 
Islands Trust Object," and stating that the Object "is fundamentally about conservation-
oriented, place-based protection... not traditional human-centric land-use planning." 
 
Instead, the only legal opinions made public so far are two excerpts, both by the same 
lawyer Bill Buholzer --one apparently written in 2000 and another from 2020. 
 
This lack of evidence and openness is deeply alarming, especially as the proposed new 
interpretation was reached behind closed doors at an in-camera meeting.  No information 
has been released as to who was at that meeting, how they voted, or whether a proper 
vote was even held.  Closed meetings are sometimes justified to hear sensitive legal 
advice, but they are not for discussing public policy in secret.  That is at best an abuse of 
process, and at worst may be a breach of law.   
 
Council Executive and the Governance Cte seem to be promoting a narrative that the 
Islands Trust Act's wording is vague.  The Oxford English Dictionary defines "unique" as 
"one of a kind" or "unparalleled." The Gulf Islands are indeed unique in their outstanding 
natural beauty and fragile environment.   "Housing, livelihoods, infrastructure and 
tourism" are not unique.  They can be found anywher

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