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posted by Robert DeVet in on Oct 19, 2014 - View profile

Hubley

What Ever Became of Buy Back the Mersey?

URGENT PUBLIC MEETING


7:00pm
- 9:00pm
Monday October 20 2014

Venue: Hubley Community Centre
Address: 4408 St. Margaret’s Bay Rd

» More information

The people of St. Margaret’s Bay are up in arms. July 17th, 2012, at this very spot, the Hubley Community Centre, they started what would become the province-wide Buy Back the Mersey movement.  Six months and thousands of volunteer hours later the province did just that - they bought back the former Bowater-Mersey lands.  The people had spoken.  The hard-working volunteers thought they’d won, that they would finally have a say in how their forests were managed. Guess what?  They were wrong.  The opposite happened.  They were marginalized, ignored, and opposed by the Department of Natural Resources, which is licensing harvest with no transparency, no accountability, and no assurance of good practices.  It’s same old same old, only worse. 

 

The citizens ask: The province’s Natural Resources Strategy has been in place for over three years.  Has there been progress on its goals like reducing clearcutting by 50%?  Government agreed to “build a culture of collaboration, innovation, and mutual accountability” and “include interested groups (like the SMBSA) in planning and decision making.”  So far, nothing. 

 

This coming Monday night, October 20th, 7 PM, 250 citizens of St. Margaret’s Bay will try to get things back on track. 

 

For more information, please contact SMBStewardship@gmail.com or call Geoff LeBoutillier at 823-1404.

 


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Topics: Environment
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