October 17, 2007
VICTORIA — The Tsawwassen First Nation’s first land-use plan, expected to be completed next spring, should lay the groundwork to develop farmland adjacent to the Roberts Bank container terminal, Chief Kim Baird said yesterday.
Today, the 207 hectares of protected farmland is growing fall crops of turnips, beans and grains.
In the future, it could be home to container storage, coffee shops and other spin-off businesses from the growing Delta port facility that bisects the tiny urban band’s lands.
“I do think we want to develop it, but how we develop it is unknown at this point,” Ms. Baird said in an interview yesterday. It is the closest she has come to outlining the band’s intentions to use that land to benefit from the expansion plans for the port facility.
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“People are tired of poverty. People who have land they haven’t been able to develop don’t want to wait any longer,” she said.
Dozens of businesses are lined up outside the door of the Tsawwassen First Nation to pounce on the chance to do business with this government-in-waiting.
The planners are figuring out where to lay down sewer and water lines.
But that awaits the land-use plan, currently being drafted by the Tsawwassen people. It’s a key part of the band’s economic development and the centre of much of the controversy surrounding the proposed treaty.
MLA Michael Sather (Maple Ridge-Pitt Meadows) was suspended from the New Democratic Party caucus because he intends to break ranks and vote against the treaty.
He said yesterday he believes development of the farmlands, currently in the Agricultural Land Reserve, is a done deal.
“It’s some of the top farmland we have in B.C … a big piece of farmland being alienated,” he said.
Corky Evans, the New Democratic MLA for Nelson-Creston, was the agriculture minister in the 1990s who decided to retain that parcel of farmland for the settlement of treaties.
“I said I’m holding this land back because I believe in treaties,” he said. “I still do. But it was my expectation it would be in the Agricultural Land Reserve.”
Mr. Evans said the Tsawwassen should be free to develop it only if the Agricultural Land Commission agrees to release it. He has said he will abstain from the final vote on the treaty.
Ms. Baird said the attacks over the land issue are unfortunate.
“A lot of people expect us to fail, to make poor decisions,” she said. “I’ve often joked that I have a development model, ‘here’s the penitentiary, the casino and the high rises’… And then they’ll be happy with whatever we do.”
Ms. Baird was in Victoria yesterday to watch the opening of the treaty debate in the provincial legislature.
As the chief sat in the public gallery with her 10-month-old daughter Sophia sleeping on her chest, Aboriginal Affairs Minister Mike de Jong opened the debate, noting that the removal of farmland “causes some difficulty” for some MLAs.
“I believe the Tsawwassen community needs the same opportunity to develop as they fit, to create employment opportunities,” he said. “I believe they will do it responsibly.”
Carole James, the NDP Opposition Leader, told the House her caucus will vote for the treaty, even as she criticized the government for bringing the farmland into the equation.
“I believe a statesman would have found an honourable way to treat with first nations and protect the Agricultural Land Reserve; a partisan would play one off against another,” she said.
“A farsighted strategist would have worked to resolve this critical land-use dispute; a mere tactician would have gone for short-term political gain. And we all know what happened in this case.”
Ms. James also called on the government to replace “every square centimetre of land removed from the ALR” with alternate lands.
For the 372 members of the Tsawwassen band, the $120-million treaty, if ratified by the federal and provincial governments, includes cash, a share of the salmon fishery and 724 hectares of land.
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