Rich 'decision has been made' Coleman must face a review after all
Vaughn Palmer, Vancouver Sun
Published: Saturday, November 24, 2007
The Opposition finally witnessed some progress this week in the effort to shed light on the government's controversial release of private land from public tree farm licences.
New Democratic Party members have been complaining about removals since the legislature convened for the fall session in mid-October.
But they didn't get anywhere with Forests Minister Rich Coleman, who has defended his action at every turn.
"The decision has been made, it's not being changed," was a typical Coleman response during the give-and-take which extended through numerous question periods.
Would the minister submit to a review by the office of the independent auditor-general? the New Democrats wanted to know.
He would not. "I have no intention of asking for a review of this decision."
Of course, as he went on to concede, the auditor-general could make his own decisions "on what to audit and what not to audit."
On the very day that Coleman made the foregoing comment -- Oct. 29 -- John Doyle was taking up his duties as B.C.'s new auditor-general.
This week Doyle announced that his first major undertaking would be to look into whether the decision to release the land was "in the public interest."
He was not responding to Opposition concerns alone. "The office has received a number of requests to examine the decision," the press release said.
The key decision was taken in January. Coleman approved the removal of some 28,000 hectares of private land from three tree farm licences on the west coast of Vancouver Island.
The controversy heated up this fall when the owner of the land, Western Forest Products, began putting some of it up for sale as recreational property.
The Opposition exploded with indignation. The government was serving Western's private interest, with no regard for the public interest.
Private forest lands -- like the tracts freed up in this case -- have been managed as part of the public forest for decades.
In exchange for locking in their lands, private companies were given exclusive access to larger tracts of adjacent Crown timber and other considerations.
But with this transaction, the company regained control of its land with no payback to the public for all those years of access to Crown land and timber.
Not so, Coleman insisted. The landowner had already kept up its part of the bargain by investing in plant and equipment and providing jobs. But now, with the forest industry squeezed by a high dollar and slumping U.S. housing markets, the company's back was to the wall.
"They were going to sell off some of this to, quite frankly, pay down some debt and stabilize their company and try to build a strong future on the island," was the way he put it in an interview with me this week on Voice of B.C. on Shaw TV.
Apart from the quasi-bailout aspect of the decision, Coleman says there were other reasons for it as well.
He says the land, being mainly along the west coast, was not likely to be subject to harvesting in any event: "This is land that most people tell me they would oppose logging on."
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