Fiscal fairness campaign branches out

Powell River community leaders have taken their campaign about fiscal fairness for ferry-dependent communities to Salt Spring Island.

City of Powell River Mayor Dave Formosa and Gordon Wilson, former leader of the BC Liberal Party and former New Democratic Party minister of BC Ferries, travelled to Salt Spring for a meeting recently. Formosa said he and Wilson were invited to the island and about 15 people attended the meeting, including an Islands Trust trustee, a Capital Regional District director and the president of Salt Spring Island Chamber of Commerce.

“Their issues are the same as ours,” said Formosa. “They’re hearing the same complaints. They’re frustrated, they feel it’s killing their economy.”

Wilson wrote a report, which he released in April, about fiscal fairness for ferry-dependent communities. It called for the government to return BC Ferries to the ministry of transportation and infrastructure and to finance it through the BC Transportation and Finance Authority.

People at the meeting came to the conclusion that they need to organize in other communities, Formosa said. “We’re hoping to get every coastal community onside,” he said. “We discussed using the chambers of commerce, because it’s a common entity that has an interest in this issue. Not only is it an issue for the public, but it’s also an issue for the business community, the tourism community.”

It’s estimated that there are about one million residents of coastal communities that are affected, Formosa said, or about 20 per cent of BC’s population. Coastal communities contribute 32 per cent of the GNP (gross national product). “We’re not being treated fairly and we’re being discriminated against,” he said. “Communities are dying. We’re fighting for our survival.”

However, he’s optimistic that the provincial government will listen and help coastal communities. “We’ll keep fighting until it’s done,” he said.

At the Union of BC Municipalities (UBCM) annual conference, Formosa and city councillors met with Todd Stone, minister of transportation and infrastructure, as well as Premier Christy Clark, about BC Ferries and the fiscal fairness campaign, Formosa said. “We had a very good meeting with Minister Stone,” he said. “We’re really starting to make some points, but we are going to have a hard time to make government put the ferries back into the transportation arm of the government.”

For the first time, Stone admitted that he believes high ferry fares are part of the reason for less vehicle traffic, Formosa said. “We’ve never heard that before,” he said. “He also agrees that the costs are beyond the tipping point.”

During the September 26 board meeting, Colin Palmer, chair of the Powell River Regional District, reported on meeting with Stone and Clark and a group of 12 regional district chairs, which he heads up, at UBCM. “We went over the serious situation that is developing with BC Ferries with the heavy debt load, increasingly high fares and how it’s punishing the economies of the whole coast,” he said. “The minister kind of made some refreshing sounds. He said powering the economy means moving people and goods.”

Palmer also mentioned the appointment of a parliamentary secretary for transportation, West Vancouver-Sea to Sky MLA Jordan Sturdy. “He has agreed that the regional district chairs can work with him and form a task force to see if we can come up with some solutions, other than what we are having to suffer right now,” he said. “He’s starting a tour and meeting each of the regional district chairs in the ferry area in the near future.”

Previously, the group has only been able to talk to staff, but now they are talking to politicians, Palmer pointed out. “If he makes some recommendations to the minister about ferries, that will be something good,” he said. “We’re all ready to find out where he’s going to turn up first and we’re all hoping he’s travelling by car and ferries.”