Recently the Oliver Chronicle reported on a proposal for a 12-home subdivision with a winery and vineyard to be built at Vaseux lake.
I have personally recreated on this property for the past few years from camping overnight to fishing and swimming.
All along the shoreline there is an abundance of waterfowl and bird life that depend on this tranquility to breed and nest in peace.
There are beavers so complacent to human life that they have swam right beside me in broad daylight. When a beaver is truly in the wild they are diurnal; when disturbed by man they are mostly nocturnal. This is a true sign they can live in peace. There is an abundance of snakes that also build their nests on this property. Snakes are deemed beneficial to any environment. In the water along the shores are plenty of hand–sized clams. I’ve never seen these clams in any of our local waters. Bighorn sheep are well known here too.
The owner of this property wishes to develop this land but we have to remember this is pristine property within and surrounded by The Nature Trust.
The applicant says this general area is already developed, but I disagree. There are hardly any houses on Vaseux Lake and the area directly surrounding this property has only two houses that have been there forever without any significant land use impact.
The Regional Growth Strategy is supposed to monitor and manage growth in the South Okanagan. There are plenty of other less sensitive parcels to develop and pave over.
This is our last jewel of a pristine parcel that could be developed forever. We can’t go back once it’s done. Do we really need a winery, vineyard and 12 large custom homes there?
What about the increased traffic and the detrimental loss of wildlife habitat? How about lake noise? The worst will be the night light pollution.
It seems every six months someone is applying for a piece of property to be lifted from the Agricultural Land Reserve (ALR). Many get approved and land gets developed. For developers it seems the ALR has become nothing but a land bank for future development. The ALR is always eroding. Farmland is always easy for the pickings.
If we allow this extensive development to go through, what will come next? These new property owners will want boats on the lake – with motors! They won’t be happy just rowing around the lake when they own powerboats or jet skis, with the urge to go fast and have fun. Our Regional Growth Strategy and our ALR must be upheld or why do we even bother discussing and implementing boundaries or restrictions.
Susan Valentine, publisher