Gambier Island Local Trust Committee regular meeting, March 3, 2021

[0:00:13] Trustee Rogers: Good evening, everyone. We're just going to wait a moment while people continue to arrive, and then we'll start.

[0:00:47] Trustee Rogers: Okay, we seem to have, oh, here comes some more.

[0:00:55] Trustee Rogers: Well, people can continue to come in while we start.

[0:00:59] Trustee Rogers: So, good evening. Thank you, everyone, for joining the virtual open house for the Islands 2050 Trust Policy Statement Review Project.

[0:01:10] Trustee Rogers: project. We appreciate you all joining us here across the Salish Sea on this beautiful

[0:01:16] Trustee Rogers: evening. My name is Dan Rogers. I'm an elected trustee for the Gambier Island Local Trust

[0:01:21] Trustee Rogers: Committee and I'm a vice chair and a member of the executive committee. I'm also a member

[0:01:29] Trustee Rogers: of the Trust Programs Committee, which is the sponsor of the Trust Policy Statement

[0:01:34] Trustee Rogers: and Review, and I'm currently gratefully and respectfully working on the traditional territories

[0:01:40] Trustee Rogers: of the Coast Salish peoples, and in particular as I'm in Vancouver tonight in the territories

[0:01:46] Trustee Rogers: of the Squamish, Musqueam, and Tsleil-Waututh First Nations. I am pleased to have been asked

[0:01:53] Trustee Rogers: to introduce Hereditary Chief Bill Williams of the Squamish Nation, who will start our gathering

[0:02:00] Trustee Rogers: to bring off with an acknowledgement.

[0:02:03] Trustee Rogers: So Chief Bill, over to you.

[0:02:09] Voice 3: I'd like to thank the organizers of this evening

[0:02:17] Voice 3: for having the protocol to be put into place.

[0:02:20] Voice 3: I also like to thank the people

[0:02:22] Voice 3: that are looking at what is happening right now

[0:02:26] Voice 3: because it is very important.

[0:02:28] Voice 3: Part of our teachings of our community, of the Coast Salish people, is that we have to look after the muntmunt, the children of our communities.

[0:02:40] Voice 3: We also have to look after our knowledge keepers, the elders, the people who have grown through time and gathered the knowledge of what's in and around where they grew up.

[0:02:52] Voice 3: And with this knowledge, they pass it on to the muntmunt, the children.

[0:02:56] Voice 3: So what is going on with this pandemic right now is very, very important because that's what Dr. Henry is talking about.

[0:03:06] Voice 3: Let's look after the children. Let's look after the adults.

[0:03:09] Voice 3: And that's part of our old teachings of the Coast Salish peoples.

[0:03:14] Voice 3: In the land that you're in with Island Trust, it's not just the 33 communities that you are registered with,

[0:03:20] Voice 3: But we have the total amount of communities of the Coast Salish is 150 communities from Oregon up to Bella Bella Bella Kula.

[0:03:30] Voice 3: And with that, that knowledge is very, very deep and very, very strong.

[0:03:39] Voice 3: Jong. Back in 2009, I, along with Chief Ian and with Yunks, Dr. Rudy Reimer, we did three test

[0:03:51] Voice 3: pits of known locations within our traditional territory. One of them is about 20 minutes away

[0:03:58] Voice 3: away from the Lions Gate Bridge.

[0:04:01] Voice 3: And we tested the carbon dating.

[0:04:06] Voice 3: And Dr. Young's, Dr. Rudy Reimer sent it down

[0:04:10] Voice 3: to a institute in Boston,

[0:04:14] Voice 3: supposed to be one of the best technical areas

[0:04:18] Voice 3: where they do carbon dating.

[0:04:20] Voice 3: And all three areas came back 10,000, 10,000, 10,000 years.

[0:04:24] Voice 3: So our knowledge of the land and the water that's in and around us, in and around each and every one of you, is to the Aboriginal Indigenous communities of Coast Salish 10,000 years old, according to your own scientific data.

[0:04:42] Voice 3: and I'd like to remind you of that fact because I can actually show people the one of the locations

[0:04:51] Voice 3: and as I say it's only 20 minutes away from the landscape bridge um so with that I'd like to

[0:05:00] Voice 3: ask each and one of each and every one of you to think of your family and your friends

[0:05:05] Voice 3: and as such we'd like to ask the creator to put a special blessing on on all your family and

[0:05:11] Voice 3: friends to make sure that they're safe and protected and that they're in a good place

[0:05:15] Voice 3: and they're not hungry and they're not hurt and they're not put in a position where they

[0:05:21] Voice 3: feel uncomfortable. We'd like to thank the creator for putting a bubble around all the children to

[0:05:27] Voice 3: make sure that they are safe and sound and they are learning the good things that you are teaching

[0:05:33] Voice 3: them as role models, each and every one of you. We'd like to thank the creator for the blessing

[0:05:39] Voice 3: of the knowledge keepers in all of our communities

[0:05:42] Voice 3: and especially in the homes that you're in.

[0:05:45] Voice 3: We'd like to thank the creator

[0:05:46] Voice 3: for putting that special bubble

[0:05:49] Voice 3: around each and every one of you

[0:05:50] Voice 3: to make each and every one of you safe and sound

[0:05:52] Voice 3: so you can continue to do the good work that you do

[0:05:55] Voice 3: in order to move ahead and create opportunities

[0:05:59] Voice 3: not only for yourself, but for your children's children.

[0:06:03] Voice 3: And these opportunities will benefit everybody

[0:06:06] Voice 3: in the best way possible.

[0:06:07] Voice 3: We'd like to thank the creator for the truly blessed day today.

[0:06:12] Voice 3: Oichika, thank you for your time.

[0:06:14] Trustee Rogers: Oichika.

[0:06:15] Trustee Rogers: And thank you, Chief Williams, and we really thank you, Chief Williams, for your words

[0:06:21] Trustee Rogers: and starting this webinar off in a very good way.

[0:06:24] Trustee Rogers: We encourage you, all of you, to think of what it means to you to be living and working

[0:06:32] Trustee Rogers: in the territory of the Coast Salish people.

[0:06:35] Trustee Rogers: it's an important thought for your day tonight.

[0:06:38] Trustee Rogers: This meeting is being conducted electronically

[0:06:41] Trustee Rogers: as you will have determined

[0:06:43] Trustee Rogers: because you've logged in in some way

[0:06:44] Trustee Rogers: and it is live streaming and being recorded

[0:06:49] Trustee Rogers: and will be available later this week

[0:06:51] Trustee Rogers: on the Islands Trust website.

[0:06:54] Trustee Rogers: We currently have 92 attendees

[0:06:57] Trustee Rogers: and people are continuing to come in on a regular basis.

[0:07:01] Trustee Rogers: We had more registrations than that

[0:07:03] Trustee Rogers: so I'm expecting more.

[0:07:05] Trustee Rogers: We're very grateful for the ability to host this virtual open house so that people can join in from

[0:07:11] Trustee Rogers: all over the trust area. We are reducing our carbon footprint when trustees, staff and the

[0:07:18] Trustee Rogers: public do not travel and we are also honouring the public health orders and guidelines during

[0:07:24] Trustee Rogers: the pandemic while continuing to have a public face and a public engagement. While staff and

[0:07:32] Trustee Rogers: and trustees are working from home, like all of you,

[0:07:34] Trustee Rogers: we are connecting to the meeting today

[0:07:36] Trustee Rogers: and have a different types of equipment phones.

[0:07:40] Trustee Rogers: We would apologize if there's any technological

[0:07:44] Trustee Rogers: or technical challenges.

[0:07:46] Trustee Rogers: We are working hard to ensure that doesn't occur,

[0:07:50] Trustee Rogers: but if they may come up over the course of the meeting,

[0:07:52] Trustee Rogers: we will try and handle them as quickly as we can.

[0:07:56] Trustee Rogers: Just so you know, the format tonight is not one of,

[0:08:01] Trustee Rogers: of it's not verbally interactive.

[0:08:04] Trustee Rogers: There's just simply too many people involved

[0:08:06] Trustee Rogers: in the as attendees in order for that to occur

[0:08:10] Trustee Rogers: and the technology would have made that difficult

[0:08:12] Trustee Rogers: and challenging.

[0:08:13] Trustee Rogers: We have muted everyone's mic to reduce the risk

[0:08:17] Trustee Rogers: of audio disruption during this meeting.

[0:08:20] Trustee Rogers: There are presentations related to the Islands Trust 2050,

[0:08:25] Trustee Rogers: the Islands 2050 project, which you'll hear about

[0:08:29] Trustee Rogers: out in a little while it's the project to renew the trust policy statement and where we are at

[0:08:35] Trustee Rogers: in that process as well there will be opportunities to ask questions if you have comments or a point

[0:08:43] Trustee Rogers: of view those won't be responded to tonight we'll be as i will be responding to questions

[0:08:51] Trustee Rogers: but you can put them in the q and a function or we encourage you to write to the trust with

[0:08:59] Trustee Rogers: with your comments or as an alternative,

[0:09:02] Trustee Rogers: attend the trust council's town hall on March 9th,

[0:09:06] Trustee Rogers: commencing at 7 p.m.

[0:09:08] Trustee Rogers: And the town hall will follow the delegations that are there.

[0:09:12] Trustee Rogers: We will be going from seven till nine tonight

[0:09:15] Trustee Rogers: and we'll be ending at nine o'clock.

[0:09:17] Trustee Rogers: So if your question is not responded to,

[0:09:19] Trustee Rogers: or we don't respond to it verbally,

[0:09:22] Trustee Rogers: you again can come to the town hall

[0:09:25] Trustee Rogers: or there may be some follow-up from some of the staff.

[0:09:27] Trustee Rogers: I want to also remind you when you're asking your questions, even in writing, that this is a place of employment for everybody you see on the screen today and a public gathering.

[0:09:38] Trustee Rogers: And despite the fact that we are in our own homes, all of the staff are entitled to be to a safe and respectful workplace.

[0:09:48] Trustee Rogers: So please keep your questions respectful.

[0:09:52] Trustee Rogers: Thank you for your patience tonight.

[0:09:54] Trustee Rogers: The format we have chosen is one that we hope provides a way to get more information out to the residents of the Trust area and to others.

[0:10:03] Trustee Rogers: So I want to just introduce some of the people you're seeing on your screen right now.

[0:10:08] Trustee Rogers: During the course of the meeting, you will only see a few faces and hear a few voices.

[0:10:12] Trustee Rogers: I am one of the panelists today.

[0:10:14] Trustee Rogers: I sit on the Trust Programs Committee as a trustee, and I'm also on the working group that you'll hear about, the Affordable Housing Working Group.

[0:10:25] Trustee Rogers: Joining me as panelists to answer questions from attendees will be Trustee Deb Morrison from North Pender Trust Committee, who is the elected trustee from that area.

[0:10:37] Trustee Rogers: She's also the chair of the Trust Programs Committee and sitting on the Climate Change Working Group.

[0:10:43] Trustee Rogers: In addition, we have with us Lisa Wilcox, who is the Trust Area Services Senior Intergovernmental Policy Advisor and intimately involved in the development of the work that's been done on the Trust Policy.

[0:10:59] Trustee Rogers: In the background, we have a few other staff, including the Director of Trust Area Services, Claire Frader, and staff with Trust Area Services, Gillian Nichols.

[0:11:10] Trustee Rogers: however the other person you will hear from and I'm going to introduce now is Delaney Hippola

[0:11:17] Trustee Rogers: who is Trust Area Services Senior Policy Advisor who will be moderating the panel and presenting

[0:11:24] Trustee Rogers: an overview of the policy directions report tonight so I look forward to talking to you and

[0:11:30] Trustee Rogers: getting your questions as we go into the evening you'll be hearing from me some more as we get into

[0:11:35] Trustee Rogers: those questions but for now I'm going to turn it over to Delaney to walk us through.

[0:11:40] Trustee Rogers: Welcome Delaney.

[0:11:45] Voice 5: Thank you Trustee Rogers and a warm welcome to everybody this evening.

[0:11:50] Voice 5: It's wonderful to have so many participants joining both online and over the phone.

[0:11:57] Voice 5: The purpose of this evening's gathering as Trustee Rogers mentioned is to discuss the

[0:12:03] Voice 5: Islands 2050 policy statement amendment project and specifically in this phase of engagement the

[0:12:11] Voice 5: policy directions report that was released to the public in January of this year along with

[0:12:17] Voice 5: an online survey we wanted to give you another opportunity to present the contents of this report

[0:12:22] Voice 5: and an opportunity to ask questions so I'm going to walk you through the contents and we've added

[0:12:29] Voice 5: in a couple of more slides that pertain to the scope of the project to give you a sense of

[0:12:36] Voice 5: the overall timeline and the priorities we've defined for this round of amendments to the policy

[0:12:42] Voice 5: statement. I'll just draw your attention for those of you who can see the presentation, there is a

[0:12:48] Voice 5: website listed here on the first page and hopefully those of you on the phone have a copy of the

[0:12:55] Voice 5: presentation it's available on our website and the website the webpage is islandstrust.bc.ca

[0:13:02] Voice 5: forward slash islands 2050. So there's a copy of this presentation along with other key links

[0:13:09] Voice 5: on that page and contact information. I'd also like to just take a moment to acknowledge and

[0:13:17] Voice 5: thank Michelle Buchholz from Cassiex Consulting who provided the beautiful illustrations for this

[0:13:23] Voice 5: report. Michelle is an Indigenous graphic recorder with quite a bit of expertise in Indigenous

[0:13:30] Voice 5: cultural safety and a methodology she has termed visual policy analysis. So in crafting this report

[0:13:38] Voice 5: we were aiming to find a mode of presenting policy in a way that was visually engaging, clear,

[0:13:47] Voice 5: and would be accessible to a variety of audiences. So just wanted to thank Michelle for her part in

[0:13:52] Voice 5: that. We were very privileged this evening to have Chief Bill Williams start us off in a good way

[0:14:03] Voice 5: with a wonderful acknowledgement and I'd just like to take the opportunity now to invite you

[0:14:09] Voice 5: to take a moment to reflect on where you're tuning in from today and to honour the rich history,

[0:14:15] Voice 5: stewardship and cultural heritage of that place. So to set the scene, this is a bit of an

[0:14:25] Voice 5: explanation about the project so we are right now updating the islands trust policy statement

[0:14:33] Voice 5: with a view to making it more current resilient to new challenges and to take advantage of new

[0:14:39] Voice 5: and evolving opportunities in the fall of 2019 we commenced phase one of public engagement through

[0:14:48] Voice 5: online and in-person engagement processes and we asked you at that time three questions what

[0:14:55] Voice 5: do you value about the trust area? What opportunities do you see to preserve and

[0:15:00] Voice 5: protect the trust area? And in the context of a changing climate, what concerns do you have for

[0:15:05] Voice 5: the next 30 years? At the same time, we began a parallel process of engagement with First Nations

[0:15:11] Voice 5: governments on the policy statement for the first time in the history of Islands Trust. Meaningful

[0:15:19] Voice 5: engagement with First Nations is critical to Trust Council's commitment to reconciliation,

[0:15:23] Voice 5: and I'll speak about this a bit further on in the presentation.

[0:15:27] Voice 5: Last summer, we summarized the first round of public feedback received

[0:15:32] Voice 5: in the What We Heard report that you see here,

[0:15:35] Voice 5: and this is available on our website, so I won't cover that too much here,

[0:15:40] Voice 5: but there are some details on the themes and comments

[0:15:43] Voice 5: that emerged through that process.

[0:15:45] Voice 5: And since then, we've been considering all this feedback

[0:15:48] Voice 5: along with the early feedback from First Nations and other partner agencies and examining how

[0:15:56] Voice 5: amendments to the policy statement could help preserve and protect what is most valued here

[0:16:02] Voice 5: in the Islands Trust area. So we're now in phase two of public engagement and we're presenting a

[0:16:08] Voice 5: sort of midway sense of our policy directions, high level policy directions and seeking your

[0:16:15] Voice 5: your input. So this was not in the policy directions report itself, but from some of the

[0:16:24] Voice 5: feedback we've received through the survey and other means, we thought it'd be useful to just

[0:16:28] Voice 5: present a bit about the scope of this particular policy statement amendment project. So this is a

[0:16:34] Voice 5: bit of a complicated visual. I'll just try to walk you through it. So here in the middle, there are

[0:16:40] Voice 5: the three strategic priorities that Trust Council has identified for this round of amendments to the

[0:16:47] Voice 5: policy statement. They are reconciliation, climate change, and affordable housing. These were set out

[0:16:55] Voice 5: as the priorities for the amendment project by Trust Council in its 2018 to 2022 strategic plan.

[0:17:04] Voice 5: That's the four-year plan for this particular Trust Council term.

[0:17:08] Voice 5: They also reflect the priorities that were identified in Trust Council's Reconciliation Declaration, as well as its Climate Emergency Declaration.

[0:17:17] Voice 5: So they come out of those three strategic documents of Trust Council.

[0:17:21] Voice 5: And as much as possible, we are trying to align our strategic policy documents with Islands Trust Conservancy's Regional Conservation Plan, which is their 10-year plan.

[0:17:34] Voice 5: So in defining these three priorities that we defined the scope for the project to include

[0:17:40] Voice 5: a holistic update of the introductory preamble sections to the policy statement which include

[0:17:47] Voice 5: an introduction, part one which focuses on the purpose and implementation of the policy statement,

[0:17:55] Voice 5: part two which deals with interpretations of the trust object and guiding principles for

[0:18:01] Voice 5: trust council and schedule one which includes some definitions of key terms so those will be

[0:18:06] Voice 5: updated holistically and then in terms of the three strategic priorities we're looking at

[0:18:11] Voice 5: parts three four and five of the policy statement through those lenses and that's the real substance

[0:18:18] Voice 5: of the policy statement it's divided into commitments of trust council directive policies

[0:18:25] Voice 5: policies to local trust committees and island municipalities, as well as advocacy policies.

[0:18:30] Voice 5: So this is where we're looking through the three lenses of reconciliation, climate change

[0:18:36] Voice 5: and affordable housing.

[0:18:37] Voice 5: And as we endeavor to do this, we are considering feedback from a number of different audiences

[0:18:44] Voice 5: and contributors from First Nations, public engagement like today's session, our own statutory

[0:18:55] Voice 5: mandates and interagency cooperation, as well as analysis by locally elected officials and staff.

[0:19:02] Voice 5: And as Trustee Rogers mentioned, Trust Programs Committee, which is the committee of Trust

[0:19:08] Voice 5: Trust Council, has been delegated to provide recommendations for amendments. And they created

[0:19:15] Voice 5: three working groups in each of these three strategic priority areas. And we have three

[0:19:20] Voice 5: representatives on the panel today representing each of those three working groups to answer any

[0:19:26] Voice 5: questions that you may have. So if anything, any input is received that is outside of the scope of

[0:19:34] Voice 5: this project. It will be considered by Trust Council for future amendment projects so we hope

[0:19:40] Voice 5: very much that this is a living document and we look forward to ongoing engagement as we make

[0:19:47] Voice 5: amendments into the future. This slide is a bit about the timeline of the project so we are now

[0:19:54] Voice 5: wrapping up stage three of policy analysis and phase two of public engagement and we're entering

[0:20:02] Voice 5: entering stage four where we're actually drafting specific amendments.

[0:20:07] Voice 5: And so this is phase two of three phases of public engagement during this particular project.

[0:20:15] Voice 5: After we draft amendment recommendations, we will be putting those forth to committees

[0:20:22] Voice 5: and then eventually to Trust Council, hopefully this June, to consider.

[0:20:26] Voice 5: And after that, there will be a further opportunity for the public to comment on the draft recommendations.

[0:20:32] Voice 5: recommendations that we put forward and that's where we'll be much more specific so in phase one

[0:20:37] Voice 5: we were really looking for your input on values and concerns this is a midway check-in point now

[0:20:44] Voice 5: at phase two where we're seeking your feedback on the policy directions that we're moving in

[0:20:50] Voice 5: and in phase three you'll have an opportunity to comment on the specifics and as I mentioned

[0:20:56] Voice 5: before we hope very much to have regular policy statement reviews we at this stage the policy

[0:21:02] Voice 5: statement hasn't been updated in many years and so we're needing to do quite a comprehensive process

[0:21:09] Voice 5: but we hope very much to engage in more annual reviews of the statement and so your feedback will

[0:21:16] Voice 5: be taken into consideration at every stage so now just getting into the islands trust object and our

[0:21:27] Voice 5: special purpose mandate to understand the policy statement it's important to understand our

[0:21:33] Voice 5: governing legislation and its origins. So in the early 1970s, the government of British Columbia

[0:21:41] Voice 5: acknowledged that unrestrained development arising from the trust area's proximity to

[0:21:46] Voice 5: major urban centers could irreversibly damage this uniquely biodiverse and ecologically sensitive

[0:21:52] Voice 5: region. This led to the establishment of the Islands Trust Act, which is a special provincial

[0:21:59] Voice 5: legislation to preserve and protect over 450 islands and surrounding waters in the Salish Sea.

[0:22:05] Voice 5: It set out a governance structure which it was a federation of 12 local trust areas and island

[0:22:13] Voice 5: municipalities such as Bowen Island Municipality represented by 26 locally elected trustees

[0:22:19] Voice 5: who come together as a regional governing body known as Trust Council. Trust Council has a unique

[0:22:27] Voice 5: regional mandate, unlike any other government in the region, in the province, for conservation

[0:22:33] Voice 5: oriented planning, regulation, interagency cooperation and advocacy. Within the Islands

[0:22:41] Voice 5: Trust Act, the object of the trust, which sort of articulates our mandate, is to preserve and

[0:22:50] Voice 5: protect the trust area and its unique amenities and environment for the benefit of the residents

[0:22:55] Voice 5: of the trust area and of British Columbia generally in cooperation with municipalities,

[0:23:01] Voice 5: regional districts, improvement districts, other persons and organizations, and the government of

[0:23:07] Voice 5: British Columbia. And the policy statement is the how. So the policy statement is meant to be a high

[0:23:14] Voice 5: level bird's eye view and a general statement of policies of trust council to carry out the trust

[0:23:21] Voice 5: object. It is currently structured into three priority areas of ecosystem preservation and

[0:23:29] Voice 5: protection, stewardship of resources, and sustainable communities. And the policy statement

[0:23:34] Voice 5: as an overarching guiding document provides a regional articulation of our policies that

[0:23:45] Voice 5: that influence and guide the development

[0:23:47] Voice 5: of official community plans, land use bylaws,

[0:23:51] Voice 5: as well as our advocacy programming

[0:23:54] Voice 5: and interagency cooperation.

[0:23:59] Voice 5: In phase one of our engagement, as I mentioned earlier,

[0:24:04] Voice 5: we asked some questions, two questions related

[0:24:06] Voice 5: to the preserve and protect mandate.

[0:24:09] Voice 5: So what did the public value about the trust area

[0:24:13] Voice 5: and what opportunities do you see to preserve and protect?

[0:24:17] Voice 5: and i'm just going to read out the this is all contained in the what we heard report in quite

[0:24:21] Voice 5: quite a bit of detail so i won't spend too much time on it here but would just read out the 10

[0:24:27] Voice 5: priority themes that emerged and they're listed here in the order of frequency of comments related

[0:24:34] Voice 5: to these themes so in answer to the question what do you value about the trust area we found

[0:24:39] Voice 5: comments related to overwhelmingly about connection to nature as well as a strong

[0:24:45] Voice 5: valued of the preserve and protect mandate planning policy and governance rural island

[0:24:52] Voice 5: culture community resilience infrastructure transportation and services biodiversity and

[0:24:59] Voice 5: species protection food and water security affordable housing cultural heritage and

[0:25:04] Voice 5: reconciliation and these are not our particular this is not our ranking of priorities but just

[0:25:11] Voice 5: to show in terms of the comments that came in these were

[0:25:14] Voice 5: the themes that arose in terms of

[0:25:19] Voice 5: what opportunities the public saw to protect and preserve the trust area the themes that emerged

[0:25:25] Voice 5: were planning and policy economics and employment alternative living and community resilience

[0:25:30] Voice 5: resilience, partnerships and programs, water system infrastructure and management, biodiversity

[0:25:37] Voice 5: and species protection, education and communication, food security, alternative energy and infrastructure,

[0:25:44] Voice 5: and governance.

[0:25:45] Voice 5: So we took this feedback into consideration as we are defining the policy directions and

[0:25:52] Voice 5: the ways that we interpret the trust object going forward.

[0:25:56] Voice 5: And throughout the report there are some quotes from both public engagement participants and First

[0:26:02] Voice 5: Nations engagement participants and I'll invite you to read those in the document that is on our

[0:26:07] Voice 5: website. This next slide reflects some of the comments that came in from the public that

[0:26:15] Voice 5: articulated a lot of the concerns that are being felt in the trust area and I would say elsewhere

[0:26:23] Voice 5: in the province. Comments about climate change impacts, fresh water scarcity, biodiversity loss,

[0:26:31] Voice 5: a housing crisis, destruction of cultural heritage and marine pollution. And growing development

[0:26:38] Voice 5: pressures and a climate emergency are leading to an increasingly complex policy environment where

[0:26:45] Voice 5: there are many priorities, priority issues requiring our attention and requiring new

[0:26:51] Voice 5: approaches. So we're updating the policy statement to better address these issues and more effectively

[0:26:58] Voice 5: uphold our commitments to both reconciliation and the preserve and protect mandate. And I'll just

[0:27:04] Voice 5: highlight that some of the comments that came in from First Nations engagement participants

[0:27:09] Voice 5: revolved around the need to take a stronger stance on protection of marine resources like shellfish,

[0:27:16] Voice 5: needing to understand the carrying capacity of each island as we make decisions in the trust area

[0:27:24] Voice 5: and understanding that many archaeological sites within the gulf islands have been damaged

[0:27:30] Voice 5: in the name of development so learning how to better protect cultural heritage is a key priority

[0:27:37] Voice 5: in terms of the public participant comments there was a strong emphasis on needing to have a climate

[0:27:43] Voice 5: change lens on everything the Islands Trust does. Concerns, a number of concerns about

[0:27:50] Voice 5: fresh water, potable water and the effects of climate change on water scarcity and of course

[0:27:58] Voice 5: the need for low impact rural solutions to affordable housing, creative solutions that

[0:28:04] Voice 5: address matters of social equity in the Islands Trust area. So we have quite a lot of

[0:28:13] Voice 5: pressures to balance and integrate in our policy statement amendments and we're doing our best

[0:28:21] Voice 5: to ensure that any policies within our three strategic priority areas are balanced integrated

[0:28:29] Voice 5: and support each other so that we have a strategic and regional approach to governance

[0:28:34] Voice 5: so at this point I'm going to pause the presentation we wanted to give you an opportunity

[0:28:42] Voice 5: to ask some introductory questions

[0:28:46] Voice 5: at this stage of the process

[0:28:48] Voice 5: before we get into the policy directions themselves

[0:28:51] Voice 5: in the three areas.

[0:28:54] Voice 5: And so I'm going to stop sharing my screen

[0:29:00] Voice 5: and I would invite all the panelists

[0:29:03] Voice 5: to turn their video on.

[0:29:07] Voice 5: And we have some elves behind the scenes

[0:29:11] Voice 5: collating all of your questions and I'm just going to invite them to post the

[0:29:18] Voice 5: first question. So the first question, could you please tell the community in

[0:29:25] Voice 5: what ways the new policy statement will gut local autonomy regarding bylaws and

[0:29:30] Voice 5: community plan review? So I will invite Trustee Rogers to address this question

[0:29:39] Voice 5: and then the other panelists to weigh in as they see fit.

[0:29:44] Trustee Rogers: Thanks for the question.

[0:29:46] Trustee Rogers: And let me preface my answer by saying,

[0:29:52] Trustee Rogers: in many cases, we don't know what the new policy statement

[0:29:56] Trustee Rogers: is or is not going to do because we haven't, it hasn't.

[0:30:00] Trustee Rogers: been approved by trust council so what all i can tell you is sort of general comments related to

[0:30:05] Trustee Rogers: uh the where we're where we think we're headed and some of the ideas that have come up

[0:30:12] Trustee Rogers: but at the end of the day it will be trust council that will after the debate and all of the public

[0:30:17] Trustee Rogers: input which will decide what the policy statement a will look like um so two things i want to say

[0:30:24] Trustee Rogers: about this one is uh as long as the act is is structured the way the the islands trust act is

[0:30:31] Trustee Rogers: structured currently local trust committees are independent local uh bodies they make their own

[0:30:37] Trustee Rogers: decisions related to those uh to um uh how they run their affairs and that won't change unless

[0:30:44] Trustee Rogers: the the islands trust act change secondly however i i will say that there is consideration given to

[0:30:51] Trustee Rogers: being more directive in our policies. If you've read any of the documents, you'll see there's

[0:30:58] Trustee Rogers: consideration to being more directive to require local, perhaps require local trust committees to

[0:31:05] Trustee Rogers: adopt certain policies that the Island Trust Policy Statement sets out. What those are has

[0:31:12] Trustee Rogers: not been determined yet. There's been discussion both in terms of climate change and affordable

[0:31:17] Trustee Rogers: affordable housing, but because official community plans

[0:31:22] Trustee Rogers: and land use bylaws have to accord

[0:31:24] Trustee Rogers: with the trust policy statement,

[0:31:26] Trustee Rogers: it's possible that some of the directive policies

[0:31:31] Trustee Rogers: in the trust policy statement may impact

[0:31:34] Trustee Rogers: and filter through too.

[0:31:35] Trustee Rogers: But one of the questions staff asks trustees is,

[0:31:39] Trustee Rogers: frankly, on an ongoing basis,

[0:31:41] Trustee Rogers: how directive do you want your policies to be?

[0:31:43] Trustee Rogers: And that's a question that just to be answered.

[0:31:45] Trustee Rogers: and Trustee Morrison may have something to say.

[0:31:50] Voice 6: Sure. So we also have to think about the fact that the trust area or the trust act was actually

[0:31:59] Voice 6: meant to guide regional policy and so the trust policy statement is really thinking about this

[0:32:06] Voice 6: regional policy perspective and sometimes local islands are impacted by things that are beyond

[0:32:14] Voice 6: on their local scope or control.

[0:32:16] Voice 6: And so the TPS is really, the trust policy statement

[0:32:19] Voice 6: is really a regional policy guidance document

[0:32:21] Voice 6: that aims to fulfill the island's trust object,

[0:32:24] Voice 6: which is sometimes broader than a local trust committee area.

[0:32:28] Voice 6: It guides local and regional planning decisions.

[0:32:31] Voice 6: It can influence the OCPs like Trustee Rogers has said.

[0:32:35] Voice 6: And we really need to think about what as a group

[0:32:39] Voice 6: of trustees across the whole area are the big things

[0:32:43] Voice 6: that we do want to be more directive about and what don't we want to be all of these things

[0:32:49] Voice 6: still have to be locally implemented and so as model bylaws or as pieces of the policy are

[0:32:56] Voice 6: started to implement in local bylaws and local ocps that's where you start to get island specific

[0:33:01] Voice 6: work that's grounded in indigenous local and scientific knowledge so um it's not quite so

[0:33:08] Voice 6: simple that there's a getting of local autonomy local autonomy is definitely ingrained in the act

[0:33:13] Voice 6: as it stands right now uh lisa did you want to add anything no

[0:33:21] Voice 4: thank you that um just really

[0:33:23] Voice 4: appreciate everyone's questions and and their thoughts and i think we are undertaking some

[0:33:29] Voice 4: really important work in reconciliation across the region and uh and also working really closely with

[0:33:37] Voice 4: each local trust committee um to fulfill those guiding principles of reconciliation on the

[0:33:44] Voice 4: islands and throughout the region as well thank

[0:33:50] Voice 5: you everyone um and so we'll just invite the next

[0:33:54] Voice 5: question okay so some of these questions came in advance and so i had a look at this question it's

[0:34:18] Voice 5: it's a bit long so with your permission i'm going to paraphrase a little bit um so the the um

[0:34:24] Voice 5: participant is drawing attention to the uh what is perceived as the low participation

[0:34:30] Voice 5: participation of islanders in our engagement process to date, in reference to the population

[0:34:39] Voice 5: of Denman Island, but also in reference to the trust area as a whole. So given such low community

[0:34:47] Voice 5: participation, would you please acknowledge that your process is not representing the population

[0:34:52] Voice 5: nor communities of the islands? Why are you removing more of our powers for local community

[0:34:59] Voice 5: decision-making and in this case the participant is asking how are we on Denman Island to continue

[0:35:05] Voice 5: to represent our unique environmental and community fabric interests when they are carried by only two

[0:35:12] Voice 5: trustees at your table and so that one I'm going to direct to Trustee Morrison. All right

[0:35:19] Voice 6: so all

[0:35:21] Voice 6: trustees at the trust council represent across the trust area and are concerned and try to meet

[0:35:28] Voice 6: the guidance that's set out in the act um of course that's going to adjust a little bit more

[0:35:34] Voice 6: locally but still as participants inside the trust area that is what the trustees across the council

[0:35:40] Voice 6: are mandated to do um there have been a number of opportunities for public engagement um in addition

[0:35:47] Voice 6: we have met and engaged with first nations in the in the area and they've commented on the policy

[0:35:53] Voice 6: statement, especially the Tlaileman, and we welcome correspondence at any time to Islands

[0:36:02] Voice 6: 2050 at islandstrust.bc.ca, email address. You're welcome to write in throughout this process.

[0:36:10] Voice 6: There's a number of different points where you can do that, and we'll be able to post that.

[0:36:16] Voice 6: Maybe, Don, do you have anything else you want to add to that?

[0:36:20] Trustee Rogers: I just want to, I do want a couple things to add. This is in some ways tied into the answer

[0:36:26] Trustee Rogers: we gave to the first question about local autonomy and I hope that addresses some of

[0:36:30] Trustee Rogers: the questions there. I also want to say I'm actually quite thrilled by the level of input

[0:36:38] Trustee Rogers: we've had. Yes you could put it in percentage terms in the way that was done in the question

[0:36:44] Trustee Rogers: in the sense that only 7% or just under 7%

[0:36:49] Trustee Rogers: of the population weighed in.

[0:36:51] Trustee Rogers: But I think if you compare that to most communities

[0:36:54] Trustee Rogers: and when they do community engagement

[0:36:56] Trustee Rogers: and policies of this nature,

[0:36:58] Trustee Rogers: as opposed to budgets or something like that,

[0:36:59] Trustee Rogers: I think that's a very good response rate.

[0:37:03] Trustee Rogers: And as Trustee Morrison said, lots of opportunities.

[0:37:07] Trustee Rogers: I guess my answer would be,

[0:37:09] Trustee Rogers: if there's something on Denman

[0:37:10] Trustee Rogers: that you think is incredibly important,

[0:37:12] Trustee Rogers: um let us know and uh and and do and and you know let get get more people to let us know

[0:37:21] Trustee Rogers: so i'm actually want to commend staff on how much engagement and there's more to come

[0:37:26] Trustee Rogers: be honest so i

[0:37:31] Voice 4: think in regards to our engagement up around denman and hornby we've had really

[0:37:37] Voice 4: exciting engagement that we've undertaken with regards to reconciliation and also working with

[0:37:44] Voice 4: Sliamon, meeting with Natsuma Tribal Council and with Comox and these are really important meetings

[0:37:51] Voice 4: where in the past First Nations hadn't had that opportunity to talk about their concerns in

[0:37:59] Voice 4: regards to the policy statement and some of the foundation documents of the Islands Trust. So

[0:38:04] Voice 4: we're really excited about that and are continuing those meaningful engagements and meetings.

[0:38:14] Voice 4: in as the as we move through the phases of the policy statement thank

[0:38:21] Voice 5: you lisa um okay are we

[0:38:23] Voice 5: ready for the next question how will the work of the trust programs committee effectively address

[0:38:35] Voice 5: a current failure in implementation of the intention of directive trust policies in each

[0:38:42] Voice 5: local area jurisdiction and i think i'm going to turn this one over to trustee morrison thanks for

[0:38:51] Voice 6: that um as we think about the implementation of trust policy statement into local areas

[0:38:58] Voice 6: we really need trustees to lead by example so if we agree as a council that this is what is best

[0:39:05] Voice 6: for the whole the trust area and model bylaws are produced that represent different components

[0:39:10] Voice 6: of the trust policy statement for incorp for implementation into local areas then we need

[0:39:16] Voice 6: local trust committees to actually engage with that locally and adopt those. And if they need

[0:39:22] Voice 6: to be adjusted for local concerns, then they get adjusted for local concern as needed.

[0:39:28] Voice 6: Additionally, we know that education and learning across the area can really help

[0:39:33] Voice 6: with areas of the trust council strategic plan. And we've already woven some education efforts

[0:39:40] Voice 6: in this last year to really help build consensus across the trust area and help people understand

[0:39:45] Voice 6: why the trust policy statement is being done the way it is.

[0:39:51] Voice 6: This is not a trick of government to try and do particular things.

[0:39:55] Voice 6: It's a guidance the government is getting based on all that we're learning collectively

[0:39:59] Voice 6: to try to best meet our mandate.

[0:40:02] Voice 6: And so really trying to think about how we can foster deeper learning in particular communities

[0:40:08] Voice 6: if there is tension around the trust area and understand that will be really helpful.

[0:40:12] Voice 6: Tom?

[0:40:16] Trustee Rogers: I'll just add, there will be issues that arise that will clearly be common across all

[0:40:26] Trustee Rogers: the local trust areas. I'm very cognizant now having, now sharing three different local trust

[0:40:32] Trustee Rogers: areas outside of my own three local trust committees, that there are differences on the

[0:40:38] Trustee Rogers: island. People have a different approach to things. However, there are issues that arise that are

[0:40:43] Trustee Rogers: are common across the area. And we could sit here and name them all. But one of them that

[0:40:48] Trustee Rogers: always comes to my mind is the foreshore and the nearshore and the issues of development on the

[0:40:54] Trustee Rogers: nearshore. And while there have been different levels of development, those are issues that

[0:40:58] Trustee Rogers: are incredibly important and we should be able to find common policy grounds. And then as Trustee

[0:41:05] Trustee Rogers: Morrison said, I agree. At that point, if we decide that something is directive, decide that

[0:41:10] Trustee Rogers: it's a common policy that we it's a value we all hold then it should be something that that

[0:41:15] Trustee Rogers: becomes a directive policy and we expect all the local trust committees to adopt

[0:41:27] Trustee Rogers: yes lisa i don't know if you want to add anything i

[0:41:32] Voice 4: know there's some common um concerns that have

[0:41:35] Voice 4: been coming up in our engagement with first nations and these are things that uh they're

[0:41:41] Voice 4: expressing to us that they want to have implemented trust-wide and like you said

[0:41:48] Voice 4: Viceroy Rogers that came up in meetings with Squamish Nation the other day talking about

[0:41:53] Voice 4: the importance of the foreshore preservation and protection of cultural heritage and ancestral

[0:41:59] Voice 4: loved ones throughout the trust area this is something that we're finding is very upsetting

[0:42:05] Voice 4: setting and where we really need to address and and make sure that we're we're upholding our

[0:42:12] Voice 4: mandate to preserve and protect and and it needs to include that cultural heritage and

[0:42:18] Voice 4: those are key themes that are coming forward and clam gardens and and eelgrass areas all things

[0:42:28] Voice 4: that contribute to the well-being not only of First Nations but of all the people living in

[0:42:33] Voice 4: the islands trust area and

[0:42:36] Voice 6: lisa you also you brought something else up that i think is really

[0:42:40] Voice 6: important to understand so while directive policies right now are difficult in terms of

[0:42:46] Voice 6: mandating um it what we can do is we can say that bylaws that counteract policies don't get approved

[0:42:55] Voice 6: so that is true being able to implement policies that we we want to be directed policies is still

[0:43:02] Voice 6: challenging but there are pieces of this work that are under other pieces of legislation and they

[0:43:08] Voice 6: must be done they're part of provincial obligations and so we need to really consider

[0:43:15] Voice 6: how to get those into place in different areas and they may not be directed in the same sense

[0:43:20] Voice 6: they're just they're necessary because of other laws that are also in place

[0:43:25] Trustee Rogers: and i agree and i agree with that just let me finish i agree with that and there are other

[0:43:29] Trustee Rogers: pieces of legislation and commitments we have made for example our actions on reconciliation

[0:43:35] Trustee Rogers: are not an option they're they're we're going to be doing that work and we're going to expect every

[0:43:40] Trustee Rogers: local trust committee to do the ministry has said that every local trust area has to do a housing

[0:43:46] Trustee Rogers: assessment those work that work will get done so there are certain obligations that arise from up

[0:43:52] Trustee Rogers: from something other than just the trust policy statement so thanks for that trustee mark

[0:43:56] Voice 4: yes and

[0:43:57] Voice 4: And I think that's really key point is that our commitment to DRIPA and to UNDRIP as we're

[0:44:03] Voice 4: moving forward, the Amnesty Trust had already committed to the implementation of UNDRIP

[0:44:10] Voice 4: and the TRC calls to action.

[0:44:11] Voice 4: And then that was in March.

[0:44:15] Voice 4: And then in November, the province also passed DRIPA.

[0:44:20] Voice 4: And so that's really important that we will be moving forward to align our policies and

[0:44:26] Voice 4: processes with UNDRIP.

[0:44:31] Voice 5: Thank you everyone great comments I will also just add in terms of

[0:44:35] Voice 5: implementation so right now we're focused on amending the policy statement and the the actual

[0:44:42] Voice 5: guiding document but after that is passed we will be looking at the implementation process as a

[0:44:49] Voice 5: secondary phase to this project and that will include looking at some decision making tools

[0:44:57] Voice 5: So we will be looking at that a bit further down the road, but our focus right now is getting the policy guidance right, and then we'll be looking at how to implement it most strategically and effectively.

[0:45:12] Voice 5: Okay, I think we're ready for the next question.

[0:45:15] Voice 5: Okay. Why is the March 9th Trust Council Town Hall scheduled after the policy statement discussion and voting on related motions earlier that day?

[0:45:32] Voice 5: If tonight is just for questions about the Islands 2050 process and report, how is Trust Council supporting democratic input on these new motions that could change the policy statement mandate and strategic priorities?

[0:45:45] Voice 5: priorities. Those motions only appeared publicly when the agenda was released last Friday and well

[0:45:51] Voice 5: after the deadline for delegation requests had passed. What use is a town hall that happens after

[0:45:57] Voice 5: the vote on important issues or a public event in advance of the vote that does not allow public

[0:46:03] Voice 5: opinion and discussion? Will Trust Council consider postponing voting on those motions

[0:46:08] Voice 5: until after the March 9th town hall? And I think I'll direct this to you, Trustee Rogers.

[0:46:15] Trustee Rogers: Thanks. And thanks to the writer for this, for getting us before the actual session.

[0:46:21] Trustee Rogers: So I've had a chance to think about this.

[0:46:26] Trustee Rogers: So Town Hall has tended to be a more generic sort of reference of people coming and talking to us about issues that were related to the trust generally,

[0:46:37] Trustee Rogers: as opposed to something specific like a trust policy statement.

[0:46:40] Trustee Rogers: But that's not really an answer to the question.

[0:46:43] Trustee Rogers: to a large extent we had considered that there had been many opportunities for engagement many

[0:46:54] Trustee Rogers: there's been the whole well you've had them laid out by Delaney during the course including

[0:47:01] Trustee Rogers: lots of opportunities to consider the issues that are captured by the by the motions that are on the

[0:47:08] Trustee Rogers: on the agenda for the Tuesday before the town hall.

[0:47:12] Trustee Rogers: Having said all of that, I can't speak for Trust Council,

[0:47:17] Trustee Rogers: but what I will tell you is that I will take the question

[0:47:21] Trustee Rogers: of whether the timing of the motions will be moved

[0:47:25] Trustee Rogers: to the executive committee for consideration.

[0:47:28] Trustee Rogers: That's all I can tell you that I can do at this point.

[0:47:32] Trustee Rogers: I think it's a, whether I agree with the question or not,

[0:47:35] Trustee Rogers: I think it's a fair request to make. And so I think we would consider as we set up the schedule,

[0:47:42] Trustee Rogers: the schedule was developed probably, I don't know, 10 days ago. We have to do things in advance so

[0:47:49] Trustee Rogers: that we can run them through a variety of processes before they get here. So that schedule

[0:47:56] Trustee Rogers: was developed 10, 12 days ago. However, the Trust Council can amend its schedule before it adopts

[0:48:04] Trustee Rogers: it. So I will take it to executive committee and take these comments there. That's what I can

[0:48:12] Trustee Rogers: commit to do. I don't know if trustee Morrison wants to.

[0:48:19] Voice 6: Yeah, I think I would say that a couple

[0:48:23] Voice 6: general things. I actually think it's better to send input in writing because many trustees need

[0:48:33] Voice 6: need more time and need to consider your ideas as a constellation of thinking with all of the

[0:48:39] Voice 6: other ideas coming in. Just because somebody comes and speaks an idea doesn't make it heard

[0:48:46] Voice 6: louder than if it was in writing. And often those that submit work in writing get more

[0:48:52] Voice 6: deep consideration because people have time to sit and think with it. So I would highly encourage

[0:48:59] Voice 6: encourage people to put their thinking in writing. Having said that, I don't need 60 emails saying

[0:49:07] Voice 6: the same thing. So please don't do that. That's not that helpful. So but it is really helpful

[0:49:13] Voice 6: to have clarity about your thinking. And if your neighbor thinks slightly different,

[0:49:19] Voice 6: their thinking and so on, that is actually really helpful. We have the email, which we can,

[0:49:26] Voice 6: And I guess it's on the website that Islands 2050 at islandstrust.bc.ca email to send things into.

[0:49:35] Voice 6: You can also send them in to others, to your local trustees, if you want to speak directly to your local trustees.

[0:49:42] Voice 6: So we do encourage that type of transmission of information because I think it's just slower and like more thoughtful.

[0:49:51] Voice 6: in terms of the scheduling around next week's trust council there's a lot of moving pieces

[0:50:00] Voice 6: in that effort and that is not the last time that any specific decision is going to be made or not

[0:50:07] Voice 6: trustees have been thinking about that those topics for the better part of a year I would think

[0:50:14] Voice 6: and so you know much of the thinking that the communities have expressed has been expressed

[0:50:20] Voice 6: asked to trustees and they're carrying that thinking with them into those votes. So do reach

[0:50:24] Voice 6: out to your local trustees if you have something specific as well.

[0:50:32] Voice 5: Okay, thank you so much. I think

[0:50:33] Voice 5: we have time for one more question in this opening section. Did you collect and can you share

[0:50:45] Voice 5: demographic information showing the age and income of respondents of the first round of

[0:50:51] Voice 5: consultation? What did the Islands Trust do to make sure working class minorities and vulnerable

[0:50:57] Voice 5: vulnerable populations were properly consulted in the first phase?

[0:51:01] Voice 5: What special strategies were used to foster inclusion for populations that have been

[0:51:07] Voice 5: traditionally or often underrepresented in public

[0:51:13] Voice 5: consultation, such as young people and low income households?

[0:51:18] Voice 5: So I think I will turn this over to Trustee Rogers.

[0:51:27] Trustee Rogers: Thanks. And we you know,

[0:51:28] Trustee Rogers: we um i'll just say we got some of this feedback earlier on after the first summary of this of the

[0:51:35] Trustee Rogers: report that what we heard report came out that perhaps um there were some people that had been

[0:51:41] Trustee Rogers: that there were some groups of people that had been uh missed um i can't tell you all of the

[0:51:48] Trustee Rogers: strategies that were done that was most of the strategies were done by uh by um by staff but

[0:51:54] Trustee Rogers: but there were also the opportunity for any trustees

[0:51:56] Trustee Rogers: to take feedback from their constituents at any time.

[0:52:00] Trustee Rogers: There is always a town hall

[0:52:02] Trustee Rogers: at every local trust committee meeting.

[0:52:04] Trustee Rogers: We rode the ferries.

[0:52:06] Trustee Rogers: I say we, our staff rode the ferries to talk to people.

[0:52:10] Trustee Rogers: We visited many, many communities

[0:52:13] Trustee Rogers: and hopefully had the opportunity for people to arise.

[0:52:18] Trustee Rogers: And there was lots of electronic engagement.

[0:52:21] Trustee Rogers: I guess my answer to the question would be, if there are ways that we haven't engaged, please give us a specific suggestion so that we can reach the groups that perhaps are feeling like they haven't been engaged with.

[0:52:38] Trustee Rogers: because we certainly tried to engage with all of the groups that are identified there

[0:52:44] Trustee Rogers: electronically on the ferries in person and at trust councils and at local trust committees

[0:52:51] Trustee Rogers: all of those opportunities exist plus the opportunity to to write to us at any time so

[0:52:56] Trustee Rogers: if there are other ways that we haven't done it then then give us specific suggestions and i'm

[0:53:01] Trustee Rogers: guessing we'll uh we'll consider those so that would be my answer i don't know about trustee

[0:53:09] Trustee Rogers: Yeah.

[0:53:10] Voice 6: Yeah, we did. As an agency, we did engage directly with First Nations. And Lisa can probably speak a little bit more directly to how that engagement unfolded. But across the engagements in communities, we didn't collect demographic information during events.

[0:53:30] Voice 6: so um that is something that just wasn't collected um with there were 24 different events

[0:53:39] Voice 6: so there was quite a number of opportunities to engage and again i just every time i hear

[0:53:46] Voice 6: somebody say that they haven't had an opportunity to engage my answer is going to be like there is

[0:53:52] Voice 6: a portal for this on the islands trust website please lean in if you think there's not enough

[0:53:57] Voice 6: engagement please email that portal information out to all of your community and have them lean

[0:54:03] Voice 6: into it that's how we work in the islands we work person to person in our communities so if you're

[0:54:09] Voice 6: feeling like your community isn't well enough engaged please pay forward the information from

[0:54:14] Voice 6: tonight and actually help them think of help your community members figure out how to comment and

[0:54:20] Voice 6: share their thinking um maybe one last thought before we go to lisa if you if you want to say

[0:54:26] Voice 6: say anything else here lisa um i do want to say that it is really important if you're engaged that

[0:54:32] Voice 6: you engage with the actual work that we're sharing not just with what you're hearing about what is

[0:54:39] Voice 6: being shared because if you haven't if you haven't looked at some of the trust policy statement

[0:54:44] Voice 6: document work that's coming out the reports you're responding to something then that you

[0:54:50] Voice 6: you haven't necessarily looked at so you you need to look at the documents because there's a

[0:54:55] Voice 6: islands are also wonderful for the telephone game we play and we need to make sure that we're not

[0:55:00] Voice 6: just going on rumor and what so-and-so said to us but we actually look at what the materials are

[0:55:05] Voice 6: and respond to them because I am getting a number of emails that are saying generalities and I don't

[0:55:12] Voice 6: know what you're responding to so the more specific you can be about something that you don't like

[0:55:16] Voice 6: and something you want to see different the better because then we can actually understand

[0:55:20] Voice 6: Through

[0:55:24] Voice 4: our engagement, working with First Nations, at this time we worked on creating capacity funding and providing that capacity funding so that there was not a barrier to being able to review and look at the policy statement, especially during the pandemic with COVID.

[0:55:43] Voice 4: COVID. First Nations communities have been hit especially hard and we wanted to be able to slow

[0:55:50] Voice 4: down our process to ensure that we were taking that into consideration and work closely with

[0:55:57] Voice 4: staff and elected officials and First Nations governments to address the needs that they were

[0:56:03] Voice 4: expressing in being able to comment on the document. And also I just I'd used a few different

[0:56:09] Voice 4: acronyms just in some of the questions that I answered. So DRIPA is the Declaration on the

[0:56:17] Voice 4: Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act, the TRC Calls to Action is the Truth and Reconciliation Commission

[0:56:24] Voice 4: Calls to Action, and also UNDRIP which is the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of

[0:56:30] Voice 4: Indigenous People. These are all foundational principles and the Act is legislation now.

[0:56:37] Voice 4: Now, DRIPA is an act, which is legislation with the provincial government for implementing UNDRIP.

[0:56:44] Voice 4: And these are all foundation documents that guide the work that the Islands Trust is undertaking.

[0:56:51] Voice 6: And I really want to highlight that the Islands Trust, you know, has been ahead, like Lisa said earlier, has been ahead of these documents generally.

[0:56:59] Voice 6: And BC is ahead of much of the world in implementing this work in this way.

[0:57:05] Voice 6: and really all should be doing this everywhere so the idea that this is something optional is

[0:57:12] Voice 6: not in play these are things that we are going to implement um also one clarification um the

[0:57:18] Voice 6: demographic information wasn't collected because of freedom of information related um uh there was

[0:57:25] Voice 6: no emails collected during the events and so there was no way to track that i guess at the time um

[0:57:31] Voice 6: So if you need clarification on that, please reach out to the 2050 email. Thank you.

[0:57:38] Voice 5: Thanks so much, everyone. And I will, at the end of the presentation today, I will share some of

[0:57:43] Voice 5: those links to our webpage, to our email, and we always welcome your feedback. So it doesn't have

[0:57:51] Voice 5: to happen through these formal engagement opportunities. You can write to us at any time.

[0:57:56] Voice 5: Okay, so I think we're going to move on to part two of the presentation. I'm going to share my screen.

[0:58:11] Voice 5: So this part of the presentation pertains to the three strategic priorities we described earlier.

[0:58:20] Voice 5: And this was our graphic recorder's way of representing the integration of these three priorities.

[0:58:27] Voice 5: So as I mentioned earlier, we're really looking at integrated, balanced, supportive, mutually supportive approaches to these three priorities of reconciliation, climate action, and affordable housing.

[0:58:44] Voice 5: I will move on.

[0:58:45] Voice 5: So on the topic of reconciliation, I mentioned earlier that Islands Trust Council in 2019 passed a reconciliation declaration.

[0:58:54] Voice 5: And I think I'm just going to read this out.

[0:58:56] Voice 5: I think it stands alone. The Islands Trust Council acknowledges that the lands and waters that

[0:59:03] Voice 5: encompass the Islands Trust area have been home to Indigenous peoples since time immemorial and

[0:59:10] Voice 5: honours the rich history, stewardship and cultural heritage that embody this place we all call home.

[0:59:17] Voice 5: The Islands Trust Council is committed to establishing and maintaining mutually

[0:59:22] Voice 5: respectful relationships between Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples.

[0:59:27] Voice 5: Islands Trust states a commitment to reconciliation with the understanding

[0:59:32] Voice 5: that this commitment is a long-term relationship building and healing

[0:59:36] Voice 5: process. The Islands Trust Council will strive to create opportunities for

[0:59:42] Voice 5: knowledge sharing and understanding as people come together to preserve and

[0:59:47] Voice 5: protect the special nature of the islands within the Salish Sea. This slide

[0:59:55] Voice 5: The slide outlines some of the work that is being undertaken in this area.

[1:00:00] Voice 5: And I will acknowledge that my colleague Lisa Wilcox is leading many of these efforts and can answer questions related to it.

[1:00:09] Voice 5: So out of the Reconciliation Declaration came the Reconciliation Action Plan, which outlines specific actions we're taking, many of which have been already undertaken, to enact this commitment.

[1:00:23] Voice 5: And there is a link on the report itself to that action plan.

[1:00:28] Voice 5: Our approach is also guided by a commitment to the foundation, what are known as the foundation documents, which Lisa described earlier.

[1:00:38] Voice 5: They include the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, known as UNDRIP,

[1:00:43] Voice 5: the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act, DRIPA, here in British Columbia,

[1:00:49] Voice 5: the Truth and Reconciliation Commission Calls to Action, and the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls Calls for Justice.

[1:00:58] Voice 5: So we have international, national and provincial guiding documents that we are aligning our actions with.

[1:01:08] Voice 5: In terms of a specific action plan, it is being led by meaningful engagement with First Nations in the trust area.

[1:01:20] Voice 5: We're engaging in inter-agency collaboration with provincial and federal partner agencies.

[1:01:27] Voice 5: We're developing policies and overlay mapping for the protection of cultural heritage throughout the Trust area.

[1:01:34] Voice 5: And our policy advisor has made recommendations to implement the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls Calls for Justice to Trust Council.

[1:01:49] Voice 5: and all uh sorry 11 local trust committees have developed standing resolutions on relationship

[1:01:56] Voice 5: building and the implementation of UNDRIP and I think it's really significant I always have to

[1:02:03] Voice 5: take a breath when I say this that this is this policy statement review by First Nations is the

[1:02:10] Voice 5: first time this has happened in the island's trust history so I think that's very significant

[1:02:15] Voice 5: and as Lisa mentioned it has involved capacity funding cooperation accords and it comes with

[1:02:23] Voice 5: a spirit of long-term relationship building as we move through this work we're guided by

[1:02:30] Voice 5: several values and interests we would like our work to be respectful in all our relations

[1:02:38] Voice 5: and embodied with a spirit of building trust,

[1:02:43] Voice 5: a protection of cultural heritage

[1:02:46] Voice 5: and acknowledging First Nations rights

[1:02:50] Voice 5: and access to harvesting,

[1:02:51] Voice 5: in finding a respectful relationship

[1:02:55] Voice 5: to Indigenous ways of knowing

[1:02:58] Voice 5: and really benefiting from those ways of knowing

[1:03:01] Voice 5: and embodying cultural safety in everything that we do,

[1:03:06] Voice 5: including within our own organization. And we have included a quote here by Justice Murray

[1:03:12] Voice 5: Sinclair from the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. The road we travel is equal in

[1:03:17] Voice 5: importance to the destination we seek. There are no shortcuts when it comes to truth and

[1:03:23] Voice 5: reconciliation. We are all forced to go the distance. This next section outlines some policy

[1:03:33] Voice 5: directions on the on the theme of climate change and i would say that many of these policy goals

[1:03:39] Voice 5: are have multiple benefits to all of our strategic priority areas so in our first phase of engagement

[1:03:47] Voice 5: we asked the public a question very specifically about climate change particularly about their

[1:03:54] Voice 5: concerns for the next 30 years and in the what we heard report we outlined the results of um

[1:04:03] Voice 5: themes emerging from that question. Overwhelmingly, respondents mentioned that ecosystem change and

[1:04:12] Voice 5: water issues related to water were of utmost concern, followed by land and marine use decision

[1:04:20] Voice 5: making, governance, transportation, community resilience, food security, fire risks, education,

[1:04:28] Voice 5: and sea level rise. So these were the topics that emerged from the first phase of public engagement

[1:04:34] Voice 5: and have guided the thinking along with engagement with from First Nations and a number of other

[1:04:42] Voice 5: contributors that I mentioned earlier in the presentation. We mentioned earlier that there

[1:04:49] Voice 5: were three working groups created in Trust Programs Committee on each of the thematic

[1:04:55] Voice 5: priorities and so what is presented here represents some of the principles and paradigms

[1:05:03] Voice 5: that came forward from the climate working group so as you know in 2019 islands trust declared a

[1:05:10] Voice 5: climate emergency declaration and with that came an imperative to think about things differently

[1:05:18] Voice 5: embodied in this principle of no more business as usual so it was felt that it's time for bolder

[1:05:25] Voice 5: environmental protections and new low-carbon ways of life. And again, this is multiple

[1:05:32] Voice 5: benefits to all of our strategic priorities. As we amend the policy statement with climate

[1:05:40] Voice 5: change in mind, we're really trying to learn and be guided by Indigenous knowledge and ways of

[1:05:46] Voice 5: knowing, ensuring that our climate action policies and processes are inclusive of traditional

[1:05:53] Voice 5: additional ecological knowledge, cultural knowledge holders, and First Nations relationship with the land.

[1:05:59] Voice 5: These are very important things that we can learn from, as Chief Bill Williams explained in the opening,

[1:06:08] Voice 5: that 10,000 years of knowing, very important for us to learn in a respectful way.

[1:06:16] Voice 5: and on that same note it's important for us to look at the broader landscape when we're making

[1:06:23] Voice 5: decisions in the trust area so we've highlighted the need to look at ecosystem-based approaches

[1:06:31] Voice 5: and we've been learning from islanders in the trust area about who have expertise in this area

[1:06:39] Voice 5: There has been a need to acknowledge the interconnections between things and to seek nature-based solutions where we can.

[1:06:49] Voice 5: Climate equity is another big theme that has come up in many of our engagement processes and internal analysis.

[1:06:58] Voice 5: There's a need to support those who are most vulnerable.

[1:07:01] Voice 5: So climate change will affect individuals disproportionately and will exacerbate some of the vulnerabilities that exist.

[1:07:10] Voice 5: And so in an interest in fostering resilient communities, we need to take that into account.

[1:07:16] Voice 5: And that will include a recognition of how policies are received and implemented on the ground, but also advocating for support in areas that may fall outside of our particular jurisdiction or mandate.

[1:07:31] Voice 5: date and lastly the precautionary principle is something that was highlighted that we really need

[1:07:38] Voice 5: to bring into our decision making in a more explicit way that there is much we still don't

[1:07:45] Voice 5: know about emerging technologies new solutions and the way the the data that we're that we have

[1:07:53] Voice 5: at our disposal to make decisions and so where there is scientific uncertainty there's a desire

[1:07:59] Voice 5: to proceed very cautiously to avoid harm in terms of specific policy goals um on the on the

[1:08:09] Voice 5: mitigation side we've out we've acknowledged that much of what we can do in the trust area

[1:08:15] Voice 5: lies in preserving protecting and restoring existing natural areas and learning to live

[1:08:22] Voice 5: lightly on the land and the trust area is quite unique though our approach to climate change

[1:08:29] Voice 5: change cannot be the same as an urban approach. We have unique conditions and unique strengths

[1:08:35] Voice 5: that we need to take into consideration as we craft our policy guidance. So one of the

[1:08:42] Voice 5: primary things we can do is simply protect what we have, preserving, protecting, and restoring

[1:08:47] Voice 5: carbon sinks. Carbon sinks are forest or ocean or other natural environment areas viewed in terms

[1:08:55] Voice 5: of their ability to absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. They can include forests,

[1:09:02] Voice 5: green spaces, soils, wetlands and eelgrass meadows. We also need to foster low carbon,

[1:09:10] Voice 5: compact and connected communities and here's where some of the implementation will be very

[1:09:18] Voice 5: locally specific and appropriate to the local, the island in question. But in general, in broad

[1:09:26] Voice 5: strokes, we need to plan for smaller footprints. A lot of the inequity that exists is a result of

[1:09:34] Voice 5: development paradigms and planning processes that we've inherited that now need to be shifted

[1:09:40] Voice 5: to a more low carbon approach. And that will have, again, multiple benefits. So planning for

[1:09:47] Voice 5: smaller footprints clustering development where it makes sense it may not make sense in certain

[1:09:52] Voice 5: rural environments promoting active transportation facilitating active transportation where we can

[1:09:59] Voice 5: and promoting low carbon agriculture and low carbon buildings so some things don't fall

[1:10:06] Voice 5: squarely into our mandate but we do have an ability to influence these things through zoning

[1:10:11] Voice 5: and other means other planning tools and we also do have an advocacy role and work with other

[1:10:17] Voice 5: government agencies so we're trying as much as possible possible to move in that direction

[1:10:22] Voice 5: in the policy statement amendments on the adaptation side there's a need for both ecosystems

[1:10:30] Voice 5: and communities to adapt to the anticipated impacts of climate change and we've noted some

[1:10:36] Voice 5: of them here droughts biodiversity loss wildfires sea level rise extreme weather events and ocean

[1:10:43] Voice 5: acidification so one of the ways we can do that is to preserve protect and restore biodiversity

[1:10:51] Voice 5: and that will include protections for the sensitive coastal douglas fir

[1:10:57] Voice 5: ecosystems and associated ecosystems and coastal western hemlock the

[1:11:04] Voice 5: the wildlife corridors that exist throughout the trust area,

[1:11:08] Voice 5: as well as culturally significant species and species at risk.

[1:11:14] Voice 5: And we need to take a look at the interconnections between the interconnected nature of ecosystems.

[1:11:21] Voice 5: So we're looking at the marine food webs for the southern resident killer whales who are now classified as endangered.

[1:11:28] Voice 5: We also have articulated a priority to protect shorelines and foreshores through setbacks, upslope protections, and this is really important to safeguard Indigenous shellfish harvesting areas, as well as archaeological sites.

[1:11:46] Voice 5: So, multiple benefits there as well. Mitigating wildfire risk is also a priority of ours.

[1:11:54] Voice 5: there are many benefits and risks from having lovely these lovely forests in our areas and we

[1:12:02] Voice 5: need to learn how our land use planning can can mitigate the risks while maximizing the returns

[1:12:10] Voice 5: and perhaps most importantly and this we heard very loudly in the public feedback feedback is

[1:12:18] Voice 5: is the need to safeguard freshwater sustainability,

[1:12:22] Voice 5: protecting finite water supply

[1:12:25] Voice 5: and regulating alternative water supplies.

[1:12:27] Voice 5: And here we're taking a precautionary approach

[1:12:31] Voice 5: and we'll be guided to a certain extent

[1:12:33] Voice 5: by work that is going on now within the Islands Trust

[1:12:37] Voice 5: to develop a freshwater sustainability strategy

[1:12:40] Voice 5: for the region as a whole.

[1:12:45] Voice 5: On the topic of affordable housing,

[1:12:49] Voice 5: many of you are aware of the housing crisis going on in the trust area and in the province

[1:12:55] Voice 5: in general these have led to issues of social equity many islands are experiencing a shortage

[1:13:03] Voice 5: of safe secure and affordable housing and as I mentioned earlier we have inherited some

[1:13:10] Voice 5: development patterns of the past that have led to large single-family dwellings that don't always

[1:13:18] Voice 5: make sense from either from a climate change perspective or from an equity perspective.

[1:13:24] Voice 5: They've created a dynamic that we now have to try to unravel as much as possible for the long-term

[1:13:31] Voice 5: resiliency of the trust area as a whole and in doing so we can use planning tools such as

[1:13:41] Voice 5: rezoning to facilitate housing that is energy efficient and in where it's appropriate located

[1:13:48] Voice 5: close to island services. We could also require that housing density be moved from areas needing

[1:13:56] Voice 5: extra protection to areas that are less vulnerable and less biodiverse. We're also looking at the

[1:14:03] Voice 5: impacts of short-term rentals on affordability and availability of housing for both homeowners

[1:14:09] Voice 5: owners and renters and investigating where policy guidance may be needed. And here's an area where

[1:14:15] Voice 5: I think a localized approach will be the most appropriate with some broad stroke guidance

[1:14:21] Voice 5: because we have found that there are both there are benefits and negatives to the issue of short

[1:14:29] Voice 5: term rentals. So we'll be looking at more localized approaches to the guidance in this area.

[1:14:36] Voice 5: Our advocacy for safe and secure housing will be guided by the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls Calls for Justice that I mentioned earlier.

[1:14:46] Voice 5: And throughout it all, as I mentioned, we are striving for those points of intersection where our policies meet up.

[1:14:55] Voice 5: And so as we're contemplating creative solutions to address these very important issues around housing and contemplating the long-term resiliency of trust area communities, as well as ecosystems, we will be guided by policies relating to the protection of freshwater sustainability, sensitive ecosystems, biodiversity, and First Nations cultural heritage.

[1:15:21] Voice 5: Really striving for that balanced and equitable approach where there are win-win solutions for all.

[1:15:31] Voice 5: So in our policy directions report, we invited your thoughts and ideas on the contents of the report and also invited other advice that you have for us as we update the policy statement.

[1:15:48] Voice 5: we received very thoughtful, helpful feedback.

[1:15:51] Voice 5: I was quite grateful for the level of participation

[1:15:58] Voice 5: and have read the comments with much interest

[1:16:02] Voice 5: as have our team and the trustees, local elected officials.

[1:16:08] Voice 5: So we're really grateful for the time that you've taken

[1:16:10] Voice 5: and the time that you've taken to join us today.

[1:16:13] Voice 5: And so at this point, I'm going to

[1:16:18] Voice 5: lead into our last question and answer period and I will stop sharing my screen.

[1:16:25] Voice 5: And so this is an opportunity to ask questions related to the second half of the presentation

[1:16:31] Voice 5: and I'll invite the first question. Has the trust considered building prescriptive zoning

[1:16:41] Voice 5: rather than restrictive so that there is a matrix by which new ideas such as cluster zoning for

[1:16:48] Voice 5: for tiny homes could be evaluated

[1:16:51] Voice 5: for their ecological and community impacts.

[1:16:54] Voice 5: The current zoning allows

[1:16:55] Voice 5: for massive energy inefficient vacation homes

[1:16:59] Voice 5: to pour over 2,500 square foot concrete pads

[1:17:04] Voice 5: that clear cut lots.

[1:17:06] Voice 5: How is that preserving and protecting?

[1:17:09] Voice 5: So I'll turn that question over to Trustee Morrison

[1:17:11] Voice 5: to start us off.

[1:17:14] Voice 6: Sure, so when we think there's a lot in that question,

[1:17:19] Voice 6: um first of all in many areas unfortunately right now we don't have legislative control

[1:17:25] Voice 6: over clear cutting or over the cutting of forests on private lots it's a little bit variable um by

[1:17:32] Voice 6: what you're talking about and there is advocacy efforts across the trust to actually improve that

[1:17:37] Voice 6: right now um but on individual lots we are struggling with that on many islands and right

[1:17:43] Voice 6: Right now, you know, focusing on ways that we can actually work with residents to understand why we need to preserve trees around, you know, the basic health of ecosystems and carbon sequestration efforts related to climate change is actually really important.

[1:18:00] Voice 6: And so talking with neighbors and working within your communities to really help each other understand that is going to be really important.

[1:18:07] Voice 6: important. In terms of the maximum house size, this is again about the idea of prescriptive

[1:18:14] Voice 6: versus or directive versus non-directive. How directive do you want to be in the trust policy

[1:18:19] Voice 6: statement? Local islands have the control to be able to change those policies locally. And on

[1:18:27] Voice 6: North Pender here, we are actually, that's part of our land use pilot review right now is to

[1:18:31] Voice 6: to actually think about residential house size.

[1:18:34] Voice 6: And so many of those things can be done locally now.

[1:18:38] Voice 6: They are not needed to be

[1:18:39] Voice 6: in the trust policy statement broadly.

[1:18:41] Voice 6: There may be principles in the policy statement

[1:18:44] Voice 6: that are guiding around energy efficiency

[1:18:47] Voice 6: and around sort of just general pop principles

[1:18:51] Voice 6: that are encouraging islands to do that.

[1:18:54] Voice 6: Whether that becomes a directive policy

[1:18:56] Voice 6: that remains to be seen.

[1:18:58] Voice 6: I don't know that that would pass we'll see so I think maybe I'll leave it at that right now

[1:19:06] Voice 6: although one last thing about the prescriptive zoning versus restricted zoning so you know ideas

[1:19:13] Voice 6: like that that are novel around how we can plan and zone we definitely should bring those into

[1:19:19] Voice 6: conversations and communities and even if they only happen in one local community we talk to

[1:19:24] Voice 6: each other as trustees and so ideas of what might work on one island get shared across other islands

[1:19:30] Voice 6: and get shared through our staff so really thinking and working with your local trustees

[1:19:35] Voice 6: can be really productive i'm

[1:19:41] Trustee Rogers: going to pick up where trustee morrison left off and say that i

[1:19:44] Trustee Rogers: that um that while that does happen i i think it doesn't happen enough and i think there's now a

[1:19:51] Trustee Rogers: move towards doing it more um so there are there are projects going on in various island areas that

[1:19:59] Trustee Rogers: um i i think other local trust committees because of this encouragement we now have what's called a

[1:20:03] Trustee Rogers: regional planning team um and they're that that's part of this this picture it's not just about that

[1:20:10] Trustee Rogers: but it's part of this trying to coalesce ideas so um main island's probably watching what north

[1:20:18] Trustee Rogers: vendors doing around uh perhaps doing around max squares footage i will just say that that and for

[1:20:26] Trustee Rogers: example on main island we are actually specifically considering a distributed square footage model for

[1:20:34] Trustee Rogers: the island which i think is what this question is is is talking about which is a a way where you

[1:20:40] Trustee Rogers: could build make perhaps we haven't got very far but if there's a way we could develop bylaws whereby

[1:20:46] Trustee Rogers: by you could build two or three smaller homes instead of one great big home and both create

[1:20:55] Trustee Rogers: some more housing availability and have a lower footprint on the land. I know other local trust

[1:21:02] Trustee Rogers: committees are looking at that and the structures we're trying to implement would take that idea

[1:21:07] Trustee Rogers: and take it out to the other local trust areas.

[1:21:13] Trustee Rogers: I tend to agree with Trustee Morrison.

[1:21:17] Trustee Rogers: There may be some guidance in the official community plan,

[1:21:20] Trustee Rogers: but I, or sorry, the trust policy statement around that

[1:21:23] Trustee Rogers: that might come at some point.

[1:21:25] Trustee Rogers: There isn't much right now.

[1:21:27] Trustee Rogers: There is very little that would be in there

[1:21:29] Trustee Rogers: that would provide that guidance.

[1:21:31] Trustee Rogers: So, and so local trust committees are doing it on their own

[1:21:35] Trustee Rogers: as they see the issues arrive

[1:21:37] Trustee Rogers: and maybe we're late to the game, some of us,

[1:21:40] Trustee Rogers: but we're getting, we're in, we're now doing it.

[1:21:43] Trustee Rogers: So that's what I would, how I would answer.

[1:21:51] Voice 5: Great, thank you so much for those answers.

[1:21:54] Voice 5: We can bring the next question onto the screen.

[1:22:04] Voice 5: Okay, so we have two questions here

[1:22:06] Voice 5: that are a bit similar,

[1:22:08] Voice 5: but I'm going to read them both out

[1:22:10] Voice 5: and invite you to answer as you see fit.

[1:22:13] Voice 5: The first question is,

[1:22:15] Voice 5: how is the Islands Trust addressing social inequity,

[1:22:18] Voice 5: climate justice and the worsening housing crisis across the islands trust region

[1:22:23] Voice 5: through the islands 2050 planning process and potential policy statement amendment

[1:22:28] Voice 5: that's question one the second participant asked how will the islands trust prioritize

[1:22:35] Voice 5: our islands human well-being and quality of life including housing jobs public services

[1:22:42] Voice 5: businesses and small businesses alongside and with climate and biodiversity?

[1:22:51] Voice 5: So I will pass this to Trustee Morrison first.

[1:22:56] Voice 6: Well, I think I'm going to take the second question first.

[1:23:00] Voice 6: And in thinking about human well-being and quality of life in the

[1:23:06] Voice 6: trust area and how it works alongside or with climate and biodiversity.

[1:23:12] Voice 6: So Indigenous people have lived in the island since time immemorial.

[1:23:17] Voice 6: And when we're thinking about current humans living in this space, we have to think, are we really sustainable? Are we living in harmony with these islands? And that's really one of the mandates of the Act, is to actually maintain sustainability and preserve and protect the islands.

[1:23:36] Voice 6: and so this is a unique region in in all of this area of the world and humans here have to live in

[1:23:46] Voice 6: a way that is based on the values that are grounded in environmental sustainability and

[1:23:50] Voice 6: that may not be the same as the quality of life if you live in Vancouver or Victoria or up in the

[1:23:56] Voice 6: Cowichan Valley so we need to actually think about what do we mean like we throw words like climate

[1:24:03] Voice 6: justice and quality of life around and they have very specific values and meaning underneath them

[1:24:08] Voice 6: and those values of meaning might be really different in the trust area they are different

[1:24:13] Voice 6: as as they're in in the act so as we start to unpack how we're living here we have to leave

[1:24:21] Voice 6: a little bit of our arrogance behind and think really clearly about what we can how we can be

[1:24:27] Voice 6: in this place and still have this place be whole and be functioning as a, as a healthy

[1:24:34] Voice 6: ecosystem.

[1:24:35] Voice 6: So I think I'll, I'll leave it at that for a second and then throw it over to Dan and

[1:24:40] Voice 6: Lisa, see if you have other things you want to add here first.

[1:24:45] Trustee Rogers: Yeah.

[1:24:45] Trustee Rogers: Um, thank you for those words.

[1:24:48] Trustee Rogers: Um, this is obviously a huge question and one that we struggle with as a society going

[1:24:55] Trustee Rogers: going forward both as a country, as a province,

[1:25:00] Trustee Rogers: as a region, as an island area.

[1:25:03] Trustee Rogers: I mean, all of those issues are important issues

[1:25:07] Trustee Rogers: and there's lots of people that are interested in them

[1:25:10] Trustee Rogers: and addressing them and trying to work towards

[1:25:12] Trustee Rogers: some solutions in relation.

[1:25:14] Trustee Rogers: So what's the piece of the islands trust in this?

[1:25:17] Trustee Rogers: But we are, remember our tools are land use planning.

[1:25:21] Trustee Rogers: And then the other part of our tools are working

[1:25:24] Trustee Rogers: with others to make things better and happen. We sometimes call it advocacy, but actually it's

[1:25:31] Trustee Rogers: becoming much more than that. Those are what our tools are. We're not a service delivery

[1:25:37] Trustee Rogers: organization. Here's the way I look at this, and this is part of the debate we're having at

[1:25:43] Trustee Rogers: Press Council right now. I see the Islands Trust as a unique form of government in this way,

[1:25:51] Trustee Rogers: is that we have a specific legislative constituent

[1:25:56] Trustee Rogers: that nobody else does.

[1:25:58] Trustee Rogers: And that's the environment.

[1:26:00] Trustee Rogers: And it says so in our object statement.

[1:26:04] Trustee Rogers: We are responsible to the environment in the area.

[1:26:11] Trustee Rogers: That's not something that we can ignore in any circumstance.

[1:26:15] Trustee Rogers: And so you see the kind of considerations

[1:26:17] Trustee Rogers: considerations that are sort of that are implied or stated in the question and that had been

[1:26:24] Trustee Rogers: addressed by trustee morrison coming up in every decision almost every decision of a local trust

[1:26:31] Trustee Rogers: committee and on a on a grander scale they're just they're being considered now and what should

[1:26:37] Trustee Rogers: our trust policy statement and say um i i you know i'm not sure i can give a specific answer other

[1:26:44] Trustee Rogers: other than I'm confident that when we get to the end of the trust policy statement process,

[1:26:49] Trustee Rogers: the ecosystem and the environment and how humans live in it

[1:26:56] Trustee Rogers: and understanding that there's been business peoples here for a millennium

[1:27:04] Trustee Rogers: will all be reflected in the best way that we can,

[1:27:08] Trustee Rogers: hoping to achieve some of the things that are indicating that question.

[1:27:13] Trustee Rogers: So that's sort of the way I view the answer to that question.

[1:27:16] Trustee Rogers: So thanks for your words.

[1:27:20] Voice 6: And maybe

[1:27:21] Trustee Rogers: I don't know if Lisa wants to

[1:27:23] Trustee Rogers: address on this one.

[1:27:26] Voice 4: I think what's really important is that balance is ensuring that the islands hold cultural heritage values,

[1:27:40] Voice 4: values, there's sacred places, there's areas that were gathering places and landscapes

[1:27:48] Voice 4: and village sites for Indigenous people that were forcibly removed from the islands.

[1:27:55] Voice 4: These areas have been impacted over and over again by development over the history of the

[1:28:02] Voice 4: Trust and even before the formation of the Trust. So as we move forward with reviewing

[1:28:08] Voice 4: viewing the policy statement and looking at amendments we need to ensure that we're creating

[1:28:12] Voice 4: a balance and ensuring that things are done um upholding those foundation documents and in

[1:28:21] Voice 4: upholding um what we need to do in collaboration with first nations on that preservation we can

[1:28:30] Voice 4: no longer just look at some aspects of the region and think we need to just protect this or look at

[1:28:37] Voice 4: one species of the ecosystem we need to look at the interrelationship of all parts for everyone's

[1:28:45] Voice 4: well-being both for people living on the island and for first nations that have been alienated

[1:28:50] Voice 4: from their sacred locations and gathering places and want to come back and and and ensure that

[1:28:59] Voice 4: they're there on the islands and the impacts of residential school have and language revitalization

[1:29:11] Voice 4: are all things that are moving forward to make sure that this is happening on the islands and

[1:29:17] Voice 4: we want to be there making sure that we're preserving and protecting in collaboration

[1:29:22] Voice 4: with nations. So there is a balance between development and the needs of people living

[1:29:30] Voice 4: on the islands at this time.

[1:29:32] Voice 6: Maybe one last thing about that first question.

[1:29:37] Voice 6: Housing, of course, plays a key role in the well-being of the islands and the well-being

[1:29:43] Voice 6: and resilience of people and communities in this space. But is a 4,000 square foot house what we

[1:29:50] Voice 6: we need? Or is it a smaller house, you know, that's built with greener standards? And so

[1:29:56] Voice 6: thinking about housing.

[1:30:00] Voice 6: generally in that light, and then affordable housing in the context of what we define as

[1:30:05] Voice 6: housing, period. So like locally, we can define housing as smaller, which actually lowers the

[1:30:13] Voice 6: cost of housing overall and changes the landscape of housing instead of having to make larger

[1:30:20] Voice 6: housing developments. So there is no one size fits all in addressing the affordable housing,

[1:30:26] Voice 6: and it has to be done locally but there are quite a few land use tools that we have to be able to

[1:30:31] Voice 6: start to address that and so while we don't while we like i agree with trustee rogers that we are

[1:30:37] Voice 6: not a service provider in the trust we do have some controls in land use that we can use to get

[1:30:43] Voice 6: at this issue and and hold central the idea of our mandate in protecting fresh water in protecting

[1:30:50] Voice 6: sensitive ecosystems biodiversity first nation cultural heritage like lisa said but that that's

[1:30:55] Voice 6: in all our housing, not even just affordable housing.

[1:31:04] Voice 5: Thank you all for those very thoughtful

[1:31:06] Voice 5: words and reflections. Let's have the next question. What will the Islands Trust be doing

[1:31:16] Voice 5: to ensure the sustainability and viability of island culture and communities, as well as

[1:31:22] Voice 5: preserve their unique and diverse character, especially now that real estate prices are

[1:31:28] Voice 5: are making it virtually impossible for anyone

[1:31:30] Voice 5: of working class to afford a home.

[1:31:33] Voice 5: Who will serve and care for the aging population?

[1:31:37] Voice 5: Trustee Rogers, I'll direct this one to you first.

[1:31:42] Trustee Rogers: Thank you.

[1:31:46] Trustee Rogers: So this is why we have set up a housing working group

[1:31:51] Trustee Rogers: within and why the Islands Trust Strategic Plan

[1:31:54] Trustee Rogers: included affordable housing as one of its focus areas.

[1:31:58] Trustee Rogers: is in the last term there was a an islands-wide housing needs study that was done that had a

[1:32:06] Trustee Rogers: series of recommendations contained in it um and and there's a recognition that there there is uh

[1:32:14] Trustee Rogers: an affordability aspect to the islands i hear it on on um uh all the islands that i am uh chair of

[1:32:23] Trustee Rogers: of with the exception of the one that I'm the local trustee

[1:32:28] Trustee Rogers: for just because it's a different type of an area.

[1:32:33] Trustee Rogers: And so, you know, this is part of what we're trying

[1:32:36] Trustee Rogers: to develop in the housing working group

[1:32:41] Trustee Rogers: and then eventually the trust policy committee

[1:32:42] Trustee Rogers: and then eventually the trust council as to whether

[1:32:46] Trustee Rogers: or not we can implement policies or ideas and concepts

[1:32:51] Trustee Rogers: that will assist it.

[1:32:53] Trustee Rogers: I think there's a growing recognition

[1:32:56] Trustee Rogers: that what Trustee Morrison said is correct.

[1:33:00] Trustee Rogers: We have a 40, 50, 70 year history in this area

[1:33:05] Trustee Rogers: and I don't think we're unique in this area

[1:33:08] Trustee Rogers: where the development of and the sprawl

[1:33:12] Trustee Rogers: of single family homes has led to,

[1:33:15] Trustee Rogers: and I'm not trying to be derogatory

[1:33:17] Trustee Rogers: towards single family homes, I have one,

[1:33:19] Trustee Rogers: but has led to much of the housing crisis and the unaffordability and some of the climate issues that we face

[1:33:31] Trustee Rogers: because they were developed in a particular way in many cases many years ago without certain regulations.

[1:33:38] Trustee Rogers: So we're rethinking all of that.

[1:33:41] Trustee Rogers: If you look at the discussions in the climate change working group and some of the graphics that Delaney put up

[1:33:48] Trustee Rogers: about well do we need more clustered housing do we need smaller housing do we need some of those

[1:33:54] Trustee Rogers: if you look at the fact that we're looking at stvrs and how they how they impact the community

[1:34:00] Trustee Rogers: and the affordability of the community and if you look at the fact that a number of local trust

[1:34:06] Trustee Rogers: committees are grappling with affordable housing and i use that term affordable housing projects

[1:34:13] Trustee Rogers: projects um that are active and ongoing because we have the we we have a a political environment

[1:34:19] Trustee Rogers: where where there seems to be funding for those projects because they they're very hard to do

[1:34:25] Trustee Rogers: without external funding from senior levels of government and they're grappling with those so

[1:34:30] Trustee Rogers: all of those things are happening and i think there's also a recognition that none of it's

[1:34:35] Trustee Rogers: enough um but we're doing what we think we can within the tools that we have and and i think

[1:34:42] Trustee Rogers: there's going to be some local trust committees that are going to be looking at their zoning and

[1:34:47] Trustee Rogers: they're going to be looking at what they encourage and what they don't as you heard about on north

[1:34:50] Trustee Rogers: pender as you hear on main island i know there's a housing group uh a project starting on salt

[1:34:56] Trustee Rogers: spring there's a whole housing options uh program on on gabriola and and i expect there's others

[1:35:03] Trustee Rogers: that i'm not familiar with so you know we're trying to do these things as we go along so

[1:35:08] Trustee Rogers: So I'll leave it at that.

[1:35:14] Voice 5: Thank you, I think we're ready for the next question.

[1:35:18] Trustee Rogers: I don't think, did Deb get that?

[1:35:20] Trustee Rogers: Oh yeah, she was first on that.

[1:35:22] Voice 6: Oh, I'm sorry.

[1:35:23] Voice 6: I'm not sure I have anything additional to add on that.

[1:35:26] Voice 6: I think most of that I covered in the prior question.

[1:35:30] Voice 6: Maybe the only additional thing there is just about

[1:35:34] Voice 6: the idea of we're in a situation now

[1:35:39] Voice 6: where there may be policies

[1:35:40] Voice 6: and we certainly are facing that for us locally here.

[1:35:44] Voice 6: where we may need to implement policies that are not popular on an individual level, right.

[1:35:51] Voice 6: So you know and but we have to start thinking more broadly as a community, as a community 50 years,

[1:35:59] Voice 6: 100 years, 200 years from now because the choices that we're making today are influencing our

[1:36:05] Voice 6: future and we just have to shift what we think of as the quality of life and what our expectations

[1:36:11] Voice 6: are. And in this region, we could lead British Columbia in thinking about that. So, you know,

[1:36:17] Voice 6: we can be a model for how to live sustainably, but we have to choose to do that as a community.

[1:36:29] Voice 5: Okay, thank you. We have our next question. Can you explain how housing trust policy statement

[1:36:36] Voice 5: policies and local planning can take into consideration the missing and murdered,

[1:36:42] Voice 5: missing murdered and Indigenous women and girls? I think I'm going to direct this question to

[1:36:48] Voice 5: Lisa, if that's okay. Yeah,

[1:36:53] Voice 4: so the Missing, Murdered and Indigenous Women and Girls

[1:36:58] Voice 4: Calls for Justice were tabled at the federal level and approximately a year later

[1:37:07] Voice 4: the UBCM came forward asking local governments and government agencies to review the

[1:37:16] Voice 4: recommendations outlined in the Calls for Justice and to consider adopting those recommendations.

[1:37:24] Voice 4: Now Islands Trust reviewed all of the different recommendations of the Calls for Justice

[1:37:31] Voice 4: and looked at the ones that are relevant to the Islands Trust area. Those would include

[1:37:38] Voice 4: communications, cultural safety, transportation, and housing. So housing concerns would make sure

[1:37:49] Voice 4: that Islands Trust is advocating for housing policy and agreements that are inclusive of

[1:37:58] Voice 4: Indigenous women and girls, two-spirited, LGBTQ plus people to ensure that that is included in

[1:38:07] Voice 4: housing agreements and also we would want to make sure that there is transportation concerns

[1:38:14] Voice 4: when working in advocacy with ministry of transport or other societies that are working

[1:38:22] Voice 4: on transportation and housing issues that their recommendations and things that they're moving

[1:38:29] Voice 4: forward align with the recommendations that the islands trust has put forward so about two months

[1:38:36] Voice 4: months ago, executive committee passed those recommendations unanimously and those have

[1:38:42] Voice 4: been adopted. Staff will also be undertaking cultural safety training so that they're working

[1:38:50] Voice 4: to ensure their communication is aligned with the calls for justice recommendations and

[1:38:57] Voice 4: also ensuring that any other advocacy that we do focuses on this very important and vital

[1:39:04] Voice 4: vital component of ensuring the safety for Indigenous women and girls, LGBTQ plus people

[1:39:15] Voice 4: in two-spirited people within the Islands Trust region.

[1:39:23] Voice 5: Thank you. Do any of the trustees have

[1:39:26] Voice 5: anything to contribute? So I'll just invite the next question. Do all the members of the Islands

[1:39:45] Voice 5: Trust recognize there is a severe housing crisis affecting everyone in our community.

[1:39:51] Voice 5: Critical roles in health care, community services, small business and more are not being filled right

[1:39:58] Voice 5: now and things will only get worse. Will the Trust make solving this crisis even within its limited

[1:40:04] Voice 5: mandate a priority? Turn this over to Trustee Rogers first.

[1:40:10] Trustee Rogers: Thanks and I just want to say

[1:40:12] Trustee Rogers: um i cannot speak for trust council um and what they do and don't know i will say that uh we have

[1:40:21] Trustee Rogers: all been um uh provided much information about this issue uh over the uh uh i would over the

[1:40:30] Trustee Rogers: last number of uh months and years and also more recently we've had a number of delegations that

[1:40:35] Trustee Rogers: that have and letter writing that have identified

[1:40:39] Trustee Rogers: and flagged this issue for us.

[1:40:41] Trustee Rogers: So the information is there, I won't speak to awareness

[1:40:45] Trustee Rogers: and I also cannot suggest to you

[1:40:49] Trustee Rogers: that the trust council itself is going to make it a priority

[1:40:54] Trustee Rogers: except to tell you that it's in the strategic plan currently

[1:40:57] Trustee Rogers: and so there's active work going on related to it right now.

[1:41:03] Trustee Rogers: I am very conscious of the concern about this issue but I there is a discussion happening at

[1:41:13] Trustee Rogers: trust council next week related to where this issue lands in our trust policy statement review

[1:41:20] Trustee Rogers: so I think I think that's really all I could say at this stage and see if trustee Morrison wants to

[1:41:28] Trustee Rogers: add to that yeah

[1:41:31] Voice 6: i think the big part that i would add to that is we are in such a complicated

[1:41:37] Voice 6: um situation here with so many different layers of government overlapping and you know we're

[1:41:44] Voice 6: working to start to build um or not to not to start but to build on other longer-term relationships

[1:41:51] Voice 6: and extend those relationships and networks so that all levels of government um first nations

[1:41:57] Voice 6: local government um regional government provincial federal are working together so that our advocacy

[1:42:05] Voice 6: efforts aren't so much like the trust sending a letter to a minister but that we're actually more

[1:42:10] Voice 6: in conversation with each other on a more continuous basis and so there's been a number

[1:42:14] Voice 6: of different forum efforts in regional context so far um that have been sort of started up and

[1:42:21] Voice 6: others are starting up and some of them have been very focused on things and others are more broad

[1:42:26] Voice 6: I think that you're going to start to see conversations about housing get really dealt with in some of those spaces, because they are very inter-jurisdictional, where part of the services is in one level of government, the zoning might be in another level of government.

[1:42:42] Voice 6: so um it is a strategic priority of the trust to be able to address issues of affordable housing

[1:42:48] Voice 6: um and so and housing more generally is the concern related to climate change related to how

[1:42:55] Voice 6: we're working and living on the land so i do think that um many of these issues will be addressed but

[1:43:02] Voice 6: to some degree that might be sort of in in the advocacy bin um and some of those will be more

[1:43:07] Voice 6: and specific bylaws that we can implement. Maybe the last thought on that though is that I don't

[1:43:15] Voice 6: know that that will necessarily because it's more of a local context island they're different on on

[1:43:22] Voice 6: how affordable housing is impacting them and so it is going to not necessarily be in the top policy

[1:43:29] Voice 6: statement though again there may be some general guidance in the about housing I don't necessarily

[1:43:35] Voice 6: necessarily it will be woven through a number of different aspects of the policy statement

[1:43:41] Voice 6: but I'm not I'm not sure how that will turn out actually in the actual directed policies or

[1:43:48] Voice 6: anything.

[1:43:52] Voice 5: Thank you I think we have time for a couple more questions. Okay this question came in

[1:44:09] Voice 5: on beaches that have no sandlands fish eggs could you assist with removing the logs which deny

[1:44:16] Voice 5: deny access to the public beach.

[1:44:19] Voice 5: I will turn this over to Trustee Rogers.

[1:44:29] Trustee Rogers: I'm not sure what assist means.

[1:44:32] Trustee Rogers: We have yet to develop our fleet

[1:44:37] Trustee Rogers: of beach removal equipment.

[1:44:42] Trustee Rogers: And so, as I said, we're not a service organization

[1:44:46] Trustee Rogers: and I would actually say, you know,

[1:44:49] Trustee Rogers: It doesn't strike me that that's something that would be something that we would take an active

[1:45:01] Trustee Rogers: interest in. Logs appear naturally. Any attempt to amend, and I use the word amend in the broader

[1:45:12] Trustee Rogers: sense a a beach area in that way could have could do damage to the ecosystem and to potentially

[1:45:19] Trustee Rogers: cultural heritage sites and things of that nature so um i'm not seeing any uh any positive any way

[1:45:27] Trustee Rogers: to say that the trust would be involved in assisting in that regard either directly or

[1:45:33] Trustee Rogers: in a policy statement review so

[1:45:38] Voice 4: um maybe i'll just add to that uh the beach areas within the

[1:45:42] Voice 4: Islands Trust area all the way from Akatsumau Sound up to Denman and Hornby, Liskiti,

[1:45:50] Voice 4: Gabriola, Thetis, the southern Gulf Islands are areas that are rich in cultural heritage.

[1:45:58] Voice 4: Beaches are fragile and cultural heritage is fragile and has been greatly impacted over time

[1:46:05] Voice 4: by use on the beaches and alterations to the beaches.

[1:46:10] Voice 4: The Islands Trust, it would be very difficult

[1:46:14] Voice 4: for us to go in and remove anything from the beach areas

[1:46:19] Voice 4: because that could do irreparable harm

[1:46:21] Voice 4: to unknown cultural heritage

[1:46:23] Voice 4: that what is left there on the beaches.

[1:46:28] Voice 4: Many times we have with sea level rise

[1:46:30] Voice 4: are finding that ancestral loved ones are being found on beaches and cultural objects are being

[1:46:39] Voice 4: found and this is a really vital thing that people living on the islands work with the

[1:46:47] Voice 4: Islands Trust and with local First Nations to ensure the preservation of resting places

[1:46:53] Voice 4: and the midden areas, which are just vital for future generations to understand the use and the species that were used in the areas for over 10,000 years.

[1:47:10] Voice 4: So any kind of changes to beach areas would have really detrimental effects on that.

[1:47:20] Voice 4: Okay,

[1:47:25] Voice 5: thank you. I think we can take the next question.

[1:47:33] Voice 5: The province of British Columbia needs to change its forestry practices on islands,

[1:47:39] Voice 5: and the Ministry of Transportation needs to practice its own ecological best practices in remote rural areas and not just new suburbs.

[1:47:50] Voice 5: What can Islands Trust do about this?

[1:47:53] Voice 5: Over-regulating and permitting private landowners will not compensate for the environmental destruction and lack of stewardship that the province itself is responsible for.

[1:48:04] Voice 5: I think I'll turn this question over to Trustee Morrison first.

[1:48:10] Voice 6: Yeah, this is a major concern for me and for the island, which I have responsibility for.

[1:48:19] Voice 6: for. So Islands Trust is working really closely on forest issues with other ministries to

[1:48:27] Voice 6: collaboratively ensure the Protect and Preserve mandate is then upheld because there has been

[1:48:34] Voice 6: real fragmentation of jurisdiction in this area across the islands. And it was one of the things

[1:48:41] Voice 6: that when I first became a trustee, it was really noticeable. I have a forest ecology background.

[1:48:47] Voice 6: ground um so the islands trust really recognizes that the province is expressing different values

[1:48:52] Voice 6: in the region and in different legislation and in the last year the trust has drawn the

[1:48:58] Voice 6: province's attention in particular to the private managed forest land back

[1:49:02] Voice 6: there's a lot of areas that we need to do better on how we're preserving and protecting forest lands

[1:49:10] Voice 6: on private land on all different areas some of that might be come through how we again like

[1:49:16] Voice 6: like educate and work with our communities, you know, working neighbor to neighbor. As more and

[1:49:23] Voice 6: more new people are coming into the islands, it is getting challenging. So really being able to

[1:49:28] Voice 6: work with organizations, realtors, and like improve the way that we think about the values

[1:49:34] Voice 6: of the trust area as a foundational thing. So people don't come in and immediately cut all

[1:49:40] Voice 6: the trees on their lot, which we've seen a lot here, is something that we need to work on. So

[1:49:46] Voice 6: So we can both work on it from a regulatory point of view

[1:49:49] Voice 6: and we can also try and work on it

[1:49:50] Voice 6: from a community education point of view.

[1:49:56] Trustee Rogers: So thanks for that, Trustee Morrison.

[1:49:59] Trustee Rogers: Let me sort of talk about the province end of things

[1:50:02] Trustee Rogers: because we have a lot of Crown land as well.

[1:50:05] Trustee Rogers: This is where that working with others

[1:50:08] Trustee Rogers: part of our mandate comes in

[1:50:12] Trustee Rogers: because of course we're a subsidiary government

[1:50:14] Trustee Rogers: to the province and we take our jurisdiction

[1:50:17] Trustee Rogers: restriction from them. And effectively, when it's provincial land that's involved or Modi

[1:50:23] Trustee Rogers: Rand or highways, a lot of our bylaws don't apply. So we are doing a number of things and we're

[1:50:31] Trustee Rogers: trying to be more effective in our work related to this area. So one is, yes, there's a fairly

[1:50:40] Trustee Rogers: concerted attempt to try and get some of us and other local governments to get some

[1:50:47] Trustee Rogers: regulatory authority over private managed forest land. Big issue on a number of islands including

[1:50:52] Trustee Rogers: Galliano and others. We have a project where some direction has been given to the senior management

[1:51:00] Trustee Rogers: of the EC to try and work with some of the recommendations from a group called Rain Coast

[1:51:06] Trustee Rogers: about what kind of forest management practices we could influence. But that always involves

[1:51:12] Trustee Rogers: That involves working with the ministry, and we have developed a good relationship with the ministry.

[1:51:19] Trustee Rogers: And lastly, on MOTI, we have agreements to work with various ministries, including the Ministry of Transport.

[1:51:29] Trustee Rogers: And I can tell you that how effective we are may vary from place to place,

[1:51:34] Trustee Rogers: but when there's an issue related to environmental practices with the Ministry of Highways,

[1:51:39] Trustee Rogers: when we have one of those meetings with them we raise those and try and convince them to do better

[1:51:44] Trustee Rogers: so really that's our advocacy portion and the more and this is this often comes down to resources

[1:51:52] Trustee Rogers: how many resources can we devote to advocacy about something that's not directly in our

[1:51:58] Trustee Rogers: jurisdiction and and so you know that that's part of what our advocacy budget and the trust area

[1:52:05] Trustee Rogers: services goes to is trying to work with others. And I think we're doing, you know, we're putting

[1:52:11] Trustee Rogers: more into that and trying to do more of that all the time. And that's often identified as the way

[1:52:16] Trustee Rogers: forward. And I think we're developing better relationships with First Nations, with the

[1:52:23] Trustee Rogers: provincial government and with other local governments. So, and I think that's the way

[1:52:27] Trustee Rogers: forward. So. And

[1:52:33] Voice 6: maybe just before we move on, a big shout out to Rainforest for the work that

[1:52:38] Voice 6: they did do in compiling and looking through all that work and the partners that they had in doing

[1:52:43] Voice 6: that um because i think that has been very impactful in helping move things forward um

[1:52:49] Voice 6: more quickly

[1:52:49] Trustee Rogers: rainforest yes not rainbows

[1:52:52] Voice 6: raincoast conservation raincoast conservation

[1:52:55] Trustee Rogers: right rain

[1:52:56] Trustee Rogers: coast okay and i don't know if lisa had anything i'm sorry i don't always throw um

[1:53:02] Voice 4: i think as the

[1:53:04] Voice 4: the Islands Trust begins the implementation of UNDRIP, we would hope in our collaboration with

[1:53:10] Voice 4: other ministries that they are also aligning their processes with UNDRIP as well, which would

[1:53:19] Voice 4: include management plans, forestry, protection of cultural heritage in forest areas, culturally

[1:53:27] Voice 4: modified trees, culturally significant species that are within the Islands Trust area in forest

[1:53:34] Voice 4: areas and also flora and fauna that is culturally significant. So this is something that we would

[1:53:40] Voice 4: advocate with our collaboration and interagency discussions with MODY and with Ministry of

[1:53:49] Voice 4: Transportation and with Forest Lands Natural Resources Ministry and also with the Ministry

[1:53:58] Voice 4: of Indigenous Relations and Reconciliation. As the province starts to change their legislation

[1:54:06] Voice 4: to align it with the Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples Act, we hope that these

[1:54:14] Voice 4: things will slowly uh move in into place so but we are advocating and working closely with

[1:54:21] Voice 4: first nations in our discussions to meaningfully address and uh advocate for this um collaboratively

[1:54:29] Voice 4: as um it's a very important thing for the well-being of the islands and the area

[1:54:39] Voice 4: thank

[1:54:39] Voice 5: you everyone um i know we have a number of questions left but i think we have time for just

[1:54:44] Voice 5: just one more. So I'll ask for the last question to be on the screen. What actions is the Islands

[1:54:52] Voice 5: Trust doing to support agriculture on the Gulf Islands? I'll turn this one over to Trustee

[1:54:58] Voice 5: Morrison first.

[1:55:03] Voice 6: Perfect. So agriculture is variable again across the islands. It's not all

[1:55:10] Voice 6: islands in the trust area are engaged deeply in agriculture there are some

[1:55:19] Voice 6: guidelines in the trust policy statement again about protecting and preserving

[1:55:23] Voice 6: agricultural capacity the one of the things to consider is in local trust

[1:55:32] Voice 6: committees there are efforts to ensure that zoning in agricultural lands

[1:55:38] Voice 6: protects the activity in those spaces some of those are in the ALR and others are the sort of

[1:55:46] Voice 6: broader rural lands that are agricultural in nature so I know on our island we have

[1:55:52] Voice 6: an agricultural agricultural this is sorry sorry it's an awkward acronym it's AAPC all right

[1:56:04] Voice 6: agricultural. Wow, I'm drawing a total blank. It's late at night. An advisory, an agriculture advisory

[1:56:12] Voice 6: group. And so that's been really helpful in thinking through and having folks that are

[1:56:20] Voice 6: engaged in the local industry, in local farms, actually be able to speak for what they need and

[1:56:27] Voice 6: name what, how they want different bylaws to influence that. So that has been really powerful

[1:56:33] Voice 6: here. Different groups are organizing that in a number of different ways on other islands.

[1:56:39] Voice 6: Local food sustainability and sovereignty issues when it comes to First Nations

[1:56:45] Voice 6: rights in this area are all very much part of the work that local trust committees are engaged in.

[1:56:52] Voice 6: And some of that is woven into the trust policy statement, but more of that's happening at the

[1:56:57] Voice 6: local trust committee level, I would say.

[1:57:01] Trustee Rogers: Yeah, I think that's right. I mean, there are some

[1:57:03] Trustee Rogers: directive policies in the Trust Policy Statement right now. You can go to Section 4.1 of the Trust

[1:57:10] Trustee Rogers: Policy Statement. I won't read them all out. There are a number of them that relate specifically to

[1:57:17] Trustee Rogers: agriculture. That's work that continues to evolve. But I would agree that these issues tend to arise

[1:57:29] Trustee Rogers: more on a local level so for example i'm aware that denman island has just completed their

[1:57:34] Trustee Rogers: or is working on i guess they're completed their their farm plan because that's an important issue

[1:57:40] Trustee Rogers: for denman island um i i can this also arises occasionally as an advocacy issue i can recall

[1:57:47] Trustee Rogers: when the i may get my agricultural land commission wrong but they changed the rules

[1:57:53] Trustee Rogers: to restrict housing on on um uh on some of the islands sorry on on agricultural alr land

[1:58:00] Trustee Rogers: we were one of other many people who advocated for some loosening of that to allow for farm

[1:58:06] Trustee Rogers: workers to live on the properties as well and and uh that became a big issue an issue on a couple

[1:58:12] Trustee Rogers: of islands i'm aware of it being an issue on salt spring for example it may have been an issue

[1:58:16] Trustee Rogers: elsewhere and so we were an advocacy group that got involved and said you know look at that again

[1:58:21] Trustee Rogers: and the commission changed the regulations to loosen that,

[1:58:25] Trustee Rogers: to allow some housing for workers.

[1:58:28] Trustee Rogers: That's my understanding.

[1:58:29] Trustee Rogers: I don't know the details of it.

[1:58:30] Trustee Rogers: So it is something that's on in our policy statement

[1:58:34] Trustee Rogers: and we occasionally do some advocacy

[1:58:35] Trustee Rogers: and occasionally some local trust committees

[1:58:37] Trustee Rogers: do some active work on it.

[1:58:40] Trustee Rogers: It's important for on a local level.

[1:58:44] Voice 1: Also

[1:58:44] Voice 4: about, sorry,

[1:58:46] Voice 6: go ahead Lisa.

[1:58:47] Voice 4: Just also the food security is a really important

[1:58:52] Voice 4: important and vital concern for nations.

[1:58:56] Voice 4: I do recall one of the first teachings

[1:58:58] Voice 4: that I ever received was from Elder Tom Sampson about clam gardens and the impacts

[1:59:05] Voice 4: that had happened to clamming in the Island Trust area from pollution

[1:59:10] Voice 4: and the inability to access places and that alienation from locations.

[1:59:18] Voice 4: And I think that this is really important to think about within the Islands Trust area, the areas that were traditional harvesting areas, and including camas plants and other traditional medicines.

[1:59:34] Voice 4: We were listening to our cultural knowledge holder panel advisory panel today.

[1:59:41] Voice 4: And one of the speakers talked about the area being you could go out and gather medicines.

[1:59:47] Voice 4: And this is something that the Islands Trust wants to ensure that inherent right and access to food sources and the preservation and protection for the well-being of people on the islands.

[2:00:00] Voice 4: and for First Nations, and thinking about agriculture being expanded out of just what

[2:00:05] Voice 4: we traditionally think as Western agricultural practices to being vital to the whole island,

[2:00:13] Voice 4: both for fish harvesting, for gathering of plants and food sources, hunting, which were

[2:00:23] Voice 4: all inherent rights that First Nations would like to exercise on the islands and work

[2:00:29] Voice 4: collaboratively with people living on the islands to revitalize those practices.

[2:00:34] Voice 6: And I think this is one of the issues where we actually see the integration of different aspects

[2:00:40] Voice 6: of the trust policy statement. So things that are in the forestry section versus agriculture versus

[2:00:47] Voice 6: marine protection, they're actually very interwoven because forest health actually impacts

[2:00:54] Voice 6: impacts indigenous rights and sovereignty to be able to go in and actually see the plants there

[2:00:59] Voice 6: that were native plants because forest health right now might be second growth forest and so

[2:01:05] Voice 6: actually re-establishing natural forest stands allows native plants to come back into being

[2:01:11] Voice 6: so thinking about how to do that in all areas that the trust can control right now and how to

[2:01:17] Voice 6: to foster that on private lands as well

[2:01:21] Voice 6: is going to be really beneficial

[2:01:23] Voice 6: for the whole of the island's ecosystem.

[2:01:29] Voice 5: Thank you so much.

[2:01:31] Voice 5: So we are at nine, a little after nine o'clock now.

[2:01:34] Voice 5: So we just want to be respectful of everyone's time.

[2:01:36] Voice 5: I'm about to bring the session to a close

[2:01:38] Voice 5: but I just wanted to give some space

[2:01:40] Voice 5: in case any of the panelists wish

[2:01:43] Voice 5: to make any closing comments.

[2:01:47] Trustee Rogers: If I could, I just want to, first of all

[2:01:51] Trustee Rogers: I used an acronym earlier tonight, which was STVR, and I just wanted to clarify that that

[2:01:58] Trustee Rogers: stands for short-term vacation rentals. So just so if anybody was wondering out there. So

[2:02:03] Trustee Rogers: just to say thank you very much. I'm, as always, privileged to be able to work in this area and

[2:02:10] Trustee Rogers: with the Islands Trust and with the very smart people that we work. And we really appreciate

[2:02:15] Trustee Rogers: all of the comments and the ideas and the questions

[2:02:22] Trustee Rogers: that we get from the community.

[2:02:24] Trustee Rogers: I'm very impressed that we had over 400 people respond

[2:02:28] Trustee Rogers: to the most recent survey.

[2:02:30] Trustee Rogers: And I think that's a testament to the fact that people

[2:02:35] Trustee Rogers: in the trust area just are really committed to this area

[2:02:39] Trustee Rogers: and the protection and preservation in all its forms.

[2:02:44] Trustee Rogers: so thank you very much i

[2:02:47] Voice 6: want to give a big thank you to um all the participants who who attended

[2:02:52] Voice 6: this evening live and all of those who may watch in the as in the next few days as it becomes

[2:02:56] Voice 6: available um in recording um and thanks to all the staff for organizing this and being here in the

[2:03:03] Voice 6: wait at night hana on midweek so thank you very much for that um and a big shout out to the the

[2:03:11] Voice 6: the trust area staff who've organized this into Lisa for being a panelist and like chipping in

[2:03:16] Voice 6: there on all the answers to all the questions thank you very much for your thoughts and your

[2:03:20] Voice 6: and Delaney for helping facilitate this.

[2:03:25] Voice 4: Yeah and thank you I just would like to acknowledge all the

[2:03:29] Voice 4: the elders and the cultural teachings that I've received over the years the just invaluable

[2:03:37] Voice 4: valuable care that both the Squamish nation and other nations and chiefs that I worked with have

[2:03:45] Voice 4: always given me in revitalizing the cultural teachings that I had lost with the disconnection

[2:03:53] Voice 4: from our family ties and just always grateful to those elders and also for coming out into the

[2:03:59] Voice 4: community and meeting people and talking to people out in the community and just really

[2:04:05] Voice 4: uh my thoughts and um and are with people in the community as we go through this pandemic

[2:04:12] Voice 4: with your families and uh and hoping everyone is well and uh and their care as we go through

[2:04:20] Voice 4: the pandemic uh together really looking forward to when we can come together again

[2:04:25] Voice 4: and meet in community and and uh and visit with everyone thank

[2:04:33] Voice 5: you yes and i'd like to echo that

[2:04:35] Voice 5: same gratitude and thank all of the panelists for your courageous responses. These are not easy

[2:04:45] Voice 5: questions and I personally really appreciated your thoughtful reflections. I'd also really

[2:04:52] Voice 5: like to thank everybody who showed up today. We thank you for taking the time this evening,

[2:04:59] Voice 5: spending your evening with us to learn more about the project I'm going to just share some

[2:05:07] Voice 5: links for further engagement opportunities so this last slide of the presentation

[2:05:15] Voice 5: includes the link to the main web page for this particular project I'll repeat it again

[2:05:22] Voice 5: islandstrust.bc.ca forward slash islands 2050 and at that on that page you will find links to

[2:05:33] Voice 5: all of the reports and the policy statement and any documentation related to this project

[2:05:41] Voice 5: you can also sign up for the islands 2050 subscriber notice to be informed by email

[2:05:47] Voice 5: mail about any developments related to the project, as well as future public engagement

[2:05:53] Voice 5: opportunities. As I mentioned, or as was mentioned during the presentation, at the upcoming Trust

[2:06:01] Voice 5: Council meeting next week, there will be an opportunity on the evening of Tuesday, March 9th

[2:06:07] Voice 5: for delegations and town hall participants. The town hall session will happen after the

[2:06:14] Voice 5: the delegations, which start at 7pm. So that's another opportunity to come in and have your say

[2:06:19] Voice 5: to all of Trust Council. And as I mentioned, we always welcome input. So even outside of formal

[2:06:27] Voice 5: engagement opportunities, we would encourage you to email us. And I would echo Trustee Morrison's

[2:06:33] Voice 5: comments that written, written comments are read by all of the trustees, and in some ways,

[2:06:40] Voice 5: um are more digestible um and and we really do appreciate the feedback that comes in

[2:06:46] Voice 5: so you can write to us at islands 2050 at islandstrust.bc.ca um the links to our facebook

[2:06:54] Voice 5: and twitter accounts are also listed here and information on how to um access the march 9th

[2:07:02] Voice 5: town hall session are available on the main page of our website at islandstrust.bc.ca

[2:07:09] Voice 5: under the what's new section so with that i think we'll bring our session to a close for this

[2:07:17] Voice 5: evening thanking all of you and hoping to meet you again soon on the project pathway

[2:07:23] Voice 5: thank you and good evening thank you