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Frustrations with backcountry continue

"There is going to be an explosion soon." Those are the words of frustration being used to describe the simmering state of the Sea to Sky backcountry.

"There is going to be an explosion soon."

Those are the words of frustration being used to describe the simmering state of the Sea to Sky backcountry. They come from chair of the Sea to Sky Commercial Recreation Association, John Spencer Nairn, but he is not alone in his exasperation over provincial attempts to manage commercial recreation in the Sea to Sky outback.

The same sentiments are being expressed not only by the commercial recreation association, which represents the handful of operators with tenures in this region, but also by the as yet unlicensed operators and members of the public.

There appeared, on the surface, to be a moment of calm in the backcountry late last year, a collective holding of breath as the Dec. 29 deadline set by the B.C. Assets and Lands Corporation approached.

The deadline was part of BCAL’s 14 month transition plan. Operators were given a grace period until Dec. 29 to apply for licence. BCAL said enforcement action would be taken against those who did not apply by that date yet continued to operate.

But the deadline has come and gone.

BCAL still can’t say how many of the estimated 100 operators in this region did actually apply for tenure by the deadline. No "illegal" operators have been told to shut down and no new tenures have been announced.

The Crown corporation has told the Sea to Sky Commercial Recreation Association and the public they will all have to sit tight and wait for a press conference that will probably be held before the end of this month, but in the meantime the tension has, once again, started to bubble over.

SSCRA charter member and Mad River tenure holder Brad Sills is now questioning whether many operators have actually applied for licence.

Tenure holders are angry with recent "trespasses" by unlicensed operators on their tenures. They are angry about the lack of enforcement and they are frustrated at what they see as BCAL’s double standards in dealing with applicants.

For example, operators, like George Meilleur of Outdoor Adventures, have been denied tenures for infractions while others can flout cease and desist orders and still be courted by BCAL.

Canadian Snowmobile Adventures, like Outdoor Adventures, has been issued cease and desist orders in the past for infractions and most recently the company started building a yurt without permission near Woods Lake, within Mad River’s tenure.

BCAL’s enforcement officer, Bob Cunneyworth, said he did tell Canadian to stop as soon as he found out about the yurt Jan. 16, but the infractions have not stopped BCAL from processing Canadian’s tenure application.

This "blows the mind" of SSCRA members who feel BCAL is under pressure to approve a tenure for Canadian in the Callaghan Valley. It is the largest operator without a licence and the feeling is that the Crown corporation needs to start generating some revenue for its efforts.

There is also exasperation over "rental" companies that have started sending snowmobile groups into places like the Callaghan. These companies, like Outback Rentals, maintain they don’t need to apply for tenure as they are not tour operators.

The SSCRA said the rental companies are sending groups of up to 20 into the Callaghan per day. A company will deliver the sleds, gets the waivers signed and send the clients off with maps, according to Spencer Nairn.

Outback Rentals is a "one man show" run by Cory Donner and he said he as been told by BCAL’s Cunneyworth he doesn’t need a tenure.

Donner said it is the public renting his sleds and using the trails. "I really have no say in what they do and, the tenure guys, they think they own all the land. I don’t know why they get so upset. It’s not like I am cutting into their business at all. I may have two or three rentals per day," noted Donner.

"I am doing nearly what they are doing. They are doing over 100 tours in a day. It’s the public’s land so there is no reason why people can’t rent a snowmobile and go check out some stuff if they want to."

Donner said he even rents sleds to the tenured operators when their tours are fully booked. "Canadian rents snowmobiles off me and so does Whistler Freeride."

Whistler Freeride is under contract with Mad River to run snowmobile tours in their Callaghan tenure.

"There are others who rent out sleds like me," noted Donner. "There is Squamish Snowmobile Rentals, there is Tracker – a sub company of Cayoosh, then there is No Limits down in Squamish and Valley Chainsaw in Pemberton."

Tenured operators have been told by BCAL they may have to cut back on their tour numbers if public use increases in their tenured areas, but the SSCRA said if the rental companies and their clients are classified as public users, they have a problem with that.

Sills said the public is attracted by the groomed trails and facilities created by the tenured operators and it is perhaps time the public bears some of the cost burden through some kind of user pay system.

Public user groups, on the other hand, are worried that BCAL is going to plug up all the access routes into the backcountry with commercial operations like the one at Cougar Mountain and the similar operation proposed by Canadian Snowmobile Adventures for the Callaghan.

Public groups ranging from the B.C. Federation of Mountain Clubs to snowmobile clubs are worried they will be squeezed out in the process.

The Pemberton snowmobile club, for example, wants some areas set aside exclusively for public use.

"We have just huge problems with the BCAL system," said the club’s Roger Stacey. "BCAL’s mandate, although they are having trouble doing it, is to put all these commercial operators in and get them licensed, but one of the big problems we have in this valley is all the access to the backcountry is up drainages," noted Stacey.

"You don’t just pull off on the highway and start walking like you might do in the Cariboo or something." Stacey said access routes like the Callaghan, Brandywine and 16 Mile drainages have all been "plugged up" with commercial operations. One of the last remaining untenured access routes to the Pemberton ice fields, he said, is up the Rutherford, but there are at least three applications in the works for that area.

Stacey said BCAL should hold off granting any more tenures until a recreation master plan can be developed for Sea to Sky country that addresses the public’s needs as well as those of commercial operators. He said having to navigate thorough "compounds", parking lots, maintenance facilities and tour groups ruins the backcountry experience.

"BCAL says they will never stop the public from going in but they will change the experience significantly. Already people have put up illegal chains and buildings and signs," he said.

"We are fighting to maintain the balance for public recreation, not only snowmobiling but backcountry ski tours and hiking and mountain biking or anything you want," said Stacey.

He estimates in excess of six million people recreate in Sea to Sky country each year and there should be a master recreation plan like the one for the Banff area before more pieces are carved up and handed out.

"We don’t have a problem with commercial tenures but we don’t need to plug up every square inch of the corridor with them," added Stacey.

That, said Sills, is a defensible position. "Its one of the issues we are grappling with. When we started Mad River in 1982, we used to plow out the turnaround by the highway. That could accommodate 16 to 18 vehicles. It was rare to fill that up. Now the area has been expanded and we plow back farther. We now plow a road for 0.4 kilometres up to another parking lot. We plow that parking lot and we are getting 60 of the public’s vehicles parking there and we still have comments like we are plugging up the access," said Sills.

"Public user groups have to understand that we are not talking about just access anymore. We are talking about improved access and amenities like toilets, cleared parking lots and groomed trails. These things are costing somebody money."

Both the commercial operators and the public have long been saying that the public needs more formal involvement, like public hearings, in the tenure application process.

"It hasn’t been as open and transparent as the SSCRA would like to see it," said Sills.

"We are saying to BCAL ‘your Web site isn’t working as you promised it would and your e-mail address, as you have written it, is inaccurate, so where is this public feedback coming from?’" said Sills. "Clearly the public has a hard time in getting information. When the four charter members of the SSCRA had their tenures awarded, we had to have our documents at the front desk of each of the three municipalities in the corridor and at the parks office. They may not have been the best places but at least they were in a place you could see them," noted Sills.

"Five years down the road, if the public perception is that these guys were awarded their tenures without any public participation, it is going to look bad for the whole industry," said Sills. "BCAL used to tell us the documents would be available on the Web and when that line was used up, they just didn’t address it at all."

Cunneyworth said anyone who wants to see an application must submit a written request to the Surrey office. BCAL, however, had promised last year that the applications would be posted on the Internet and they were to be made available at BCAL’s Whistler office.

Much of the anger and frustration being expressed this month has likely grown out the information vacuum that has followed the BCAL transition deadline.

The lack of word from BCAL is breeding conspiracy theories and backstabbing, but the arguments are not new. The province has, after all, been grappling with a way to manage the backcountry and generate some revenue from the growing industry for more than 10 years.

Some of the current debate, however, could be moot should BCAL cease to exist in its current form come spring. This is a possible scenario should an election be called and won by a Liberal government in March, as widely anticipated.

A Liberal government would move to speed up approval of tenures, said West Vancouver-Garibaldi MLA Ted Nebbeling.

He said the Liberals estimate the province’s inefficacy in managing commercial recreation has cost the industry up to $2 billion in lost revenue and about 20,000 lost job opportunities.

"I have got the feeling that BCAL looks at applications and tries to find ways to justify rejecting them, rather than trying to find ways of making things possible," said Nebbeling. "I have seen rejection notices where reasons for turning down a permit were sometimes extremely far fetched. There are biologists working with BCAL doing analysis of applications and how they may impact the environment who go out of their way to find reasons why applications should not go through."

Nebbeling said under a Liberal government, BCAL’s responsibilities could fall to another Crown agency, but whoever is ultimately responsible for approving land tenures will have to have a pro-business focus.

"The mind set has to change with the people that work within BCAL, and if the individuals within BCAL do not have the ability of changing their mind set, they would, in my opinion, have very little chance of a long term career with the provincial government," said Nebbeling. "Changes will have to happen in order to further opportunities for people to start these small and medium sized businesses."

Nebbeling added it is a little late in the game to wait for a comprehensive recreation strategy and further delay the granting of tenures.

"If that argument had been made four or five years ago, I would totally have agreed with it. There should be a plan, it may still have to be done, but not at the cost of delaying further issuing of permits," said Nebbeling.

"A lot of people have been operating in a vacuum, and have been for a long time. I don’t want that vacuum to carry on because it is undermining business expansion, investment and new opportunities. We have wasted an enormous amount of time and things are a huge mess. At the end of the day this will be another pillar of our tourism infrastructure that will make our tourism industry even stronger than it is today."