DILEMMA OF THE DERELICT BOATS
Group demands action on boats littering Cadboro Bay beach
The derelict-boats conundrum is stuck in the sand.
The weathered hulks are large and small, wooden, fibreglass and concrete-hulled. They’re a blight on capital region beaches and pose a risk to people and the environment.
One trouble spot is the Oak Bay side of Cadboro Bay beach, site of 16 derelict boats at last count — a problem that has incensed the Cadboro Bay Residents Association.
Oak Bay-Gordon Head MLA Andrew Weaver says responsibility for the derelict vessels is a “jurisdictional nightmare” that’s caught in the labyrinth of municipal, provincial and federal governments. He says the onus is on Oak Bay to remove the derelict boats on its side of Cadboro Bay beach, while Oak Bay Mayor Nils Jensen says it’s up to the province.
Sixteen derelict boats litter Cadboro Bay beach — all on the Oak Bay side. It’s a “disgusting” situation, says Eric Dahli, chairman of the Cadboro Bay Residents Association — far worse than the five vessels the association had already demanded that Oak Bay address, and compounded by gas tanks, oil cans and evidence of fires.
He cited a 36-foot-long steelhulled wreck as the worst example despoiling the beach. “It probably had a fire on it and they just let it go.”
If it gets no response from Oak Bay to its letters of complaint, Dahli said the group plans to attend the next council meeting, set for March 13, as part of its fight to clean up the Oak Bay side of Cadboro Bay. “Depending on what they say, we will be going to Oak Bay council with torches and pitchforks if necessary.”
Oak Bay Mayor Nils Jensen has said he tried to convince B.C. cabinet ministers in recent years to take responsibility and doesn’t see why Oak Bay taxpayers should pay for a job that belongs to the province. The municipality’s jurisdiction is above the tide line, he said.
Some of the wrecks are half in provincial jurisdiction — the intertidal zone — and others are in Oak Bay’s bailiwick, Dahli said. At low tide, there is nothing to stop children from reaching the wrecks.
In letters demanding action from Oak Bay sent Feb. 9 and 19, the association said that Saanich had cleared the wrecks on its side of Cadboro Bay and expected the same from its neighbour.
The 16 derelict vessels are all located at or near GPS location 48.457N-123.298W.
Included are a 23-foot sailboat called the Shaman, a 25-foot sailboat called the Debate “filled with junk, oil containers, various materials floating in unidentified liquids with a petroleum-like sheen,” Dahli said, and a 15-foot long hunk of a Ferro cement hull.
There are also several Fiberglas dinghies and a 15-foot canoe called Mirage.
Veins of Life Watershed Society founder John Roe, a waterway cleanup veteran, plans to attend the association’s meeting on Wednesday. Both the Oak Bay Community Association and the Victoria Yacht Club have indicated they are on board, Dahli said. “The yacht club has agreed to let us use their boat ramp to drag the junk out of the water and provide some volunteers to assist in cleaning the Oak Bay portion of the beach,” planned for May 13, he said Friday.
Roe said he has received permission from Oak Bay municipal staff to borrow equipment for the undertaking. Dahli said that cleanup date is not finalized.
NDP candidate Bryce Casavant, who is running for the provincial Oak Bay-Gordon Head seat on May 9, said blaming municipal leaders for the problem is unfair.
“Municipalities and taxpayers have voiced their concerns about derelict vessels loudly and clearly, but it is the provincial government that must show leadership to ensure that this environmental issue is dealt with, rather than trying to pass off derelict vessels as only within the purview of the federal government,” he said in a statement.
Green MLA Andrew Weaver has said that Oak Bay has missed the boat on the issue, but he has also pressed B.C. Minister of Natural Resource Operations Steve Thomson to do something. Oak Bay should follow the Saanich lead and seek cost-sharing on removals with the province, Weaver has said.
A Feb. 20 email from Thomson says that he supports having ministry staff arrange to meet with Oak Bay staff early in the new fiscal year, which starts April 1, “to jointly evaluate the situation and to prepare a cost estimate and priority ranking for removal of the various vessels.
“This will form part of a plan of action in the event that operational funding becomes available and in anticipation of the federal funding that was recently announced as part of Canada’s Oceans Strategy,” Thomson wrote.
Dahli is concerned that the province will just look at the issue, not necessarily take action. “I’m hoping we can shortcut all the bureaucracy and if necessary we’re getting a work party down there and do it. And we’re going to invite politicians of all stripes to work with us.”
Carole Witter, president of the West Bay Residents Association in Esquimalt, cautioned that some of the wrecks were likely “the last stop before homelessness” for some people who once lived in them. Co-owner of Hidden Harbour Marina on West Bay, Witter said that in many cases, the boats were likely given to people with nowhere else to live and did not have motors. “They’re just a shelter, not really a boat.”