THERE'S NOTHING WRONG WITH WONDERING WHAT PEOPLE ARE THINKING
OSOYOOS TIMES-July 16, 2008
A few questions were raised about why the Osoyoos Times chose to conduct an informal survey about public opinion regarding the proposed Willow Beach Resort development.
It's true that the Times did not conduct similar polls for other recent developments such as the Indigo condominium project or the Watermark Beach Resort.
But it would be difficult to say that any development proposal that has come up in the South Okanagan in recent memory equals the magnitude of the 1,088-unit Willow Beach concept, planned for ecologically sensitive wetlands at the head of Osoyoos Lake.
Its environmental and economic ramifications for the Osoyoos area, both good and bad, are monumental in scope.
And people have been asking a great deal of questions and raising many serious concerns about the proposal for some time in the form of letters to the editor or comments at various public events such as the Osoyoos Desert Society oxbows lecture in March.
We, as a newspaper, simply wanted to know what people in this community think of the development proposal.
And it's really a shame that five of eight members of the Regional District Okanagan-Similkameen board of directors failed to share the Times' sense of curiosity about such an important issue by not showing up at the July 9 public hearing concerning the development.
The hearing was the final, and most significant, chance for local residents who may be directly or indirectly affected by the development, should it be approved, to let the board know their feelings on the proposal.
It was said that the full compliment of board members rarely show up to all public hearings, especially when the matter falls outside their area of influence.
It was said that the absent board members can get the gist of the hearing from the recorded minutes.
To hear passionate comments, both for and against the proposed development, brought up in a room where more than 250 people were gathered revealed just how much this issue is weighing on the minds of so many people in Osoyoos and beyond.
Yet there was so much more to the hearing than just words.
There was body language; the look in an individual's eyes; the concern in a person's face.
The five absent board members missed that.
If these people are our elected representatives, they should show more interest in the matters touching our communities, especially one as grand in scale as Willow Beach.
To want to know what the larger population feels and thinks is not an exercise in bias or muckraking, it is the backbone of journalism¦ and politics.
