K-Country Designated as Recreational Area?
We received this from Shaun Peter [of Bragg Creek and Kananaskis Outdoor Recreation] today. There is still an opportunity for you to have your say on what happens to Kananaskis. Public consultation sessions in Cochrane and Okotoks are coming up, in case you missed the Calgary date. Do you want K-Country to have a formal designation as a recreational area? This is probably the best opportunity you’ll have to get changes made to the way that Kananaskis works. Read on…
Hi all,
We attended the South Saskatchewan Regional Plan open house yesterday and found some very disturbing info. First there was a stakeholder meeting prior to the advertised meeting. The stakeholder meeting ran from 10am – 2pm and as far as I could tell, no-one representing recreation was invited. Sustain K and myself were unaware of the meeting. If you or your membership wants to attend one of the future stakeholder meetings, all of the advertised meetings at the following link will hold a stakeholder meeting from 10am-2pm prior to the advertised meeting at 4-8pm. When asked what a stakeholder is, they replied anyone who feels they hold a special interest in the plan. Please advertise this with your membership so we have a good representation of recreation. https://landuse.alberta.ca/Newsroom/Pages/PublicConsultations.aspx
The second discovery that was really disturbing was the Regional Advisory Council that put together the initial plan involved 19 participants of which 4 represented Suncor Energy, Oasis Energy, Spray Lakes Sawmills, and Clean Energy Capitalists Inc. No-one sat on the council that had local knowledge representing Recreation and Tourism other than Kevin Van Tighem of Parks Canada, who works out of Banff. Although 4 members of the public represented Oil and Logging, no members of the public were invited to represent Recreation and Tourism.
A reporter from the Calgary Herald was at the open house and several people expressed to her there concern that there was no representation for Recreation and that the maps reflect it. The entire HWY 66 corridor, did not receive any recognition in the proposed maps, as either a tourism or recreation area. There are over 500,000 annual visitors to the Elbow Valley, representing almost 20% of the total visits to Kananaskis yet it received no recognition. This appears to be the exact same process as the previous consultations where the government will have a large dog and pony show to appear like they want to have public input on future change, when really they don’t want to change anything.
Sincerely,
Shaun Peter
Bragg Creek & Kananaskis Outdoor Recreation
www.braggcreekrecreation.com