Salt Spring residents to vote on incorporation

Salt Spring Island residents will head to the polls Sept. 9 for a vote on incorporation.

The decision was announced by Community Minister Peter Fassbender after a committee studying the issue recommended a vote go ahead. The nine-member volunteer committee started its work in 2015, with $255,000 in provincial funding.

Islanders last voted on incorporation in 2002, with 70 per cent saying no. The island was actually incorporated in 1873 after a number of prominent residents asked the provincial government to take action, but 10 years of disagreements and lawsuits led to the municipality being dissolved.

Salt Spring is B.C.’s largest unincorporated community, with 10,640 people, and is also the largest of 13 major Gulf Islands. It is served by an electoral area director at the Capital Regional District, Wayne McIntyre, and two elected Islands Trust council trustees — Peter Grove and George Grams.

Incorporation would mean a mayor and six councillors, with one councillor continuing with the CRD and two staying with the Islands Trust.

McIntyre said it has been a four-year process for him, Grove and Grams to get an incorporation vote. He said all three were elected on platforms that recognized the community wanted the issue studied.

“We’re very pleased that Minister Fassbender supported the referendum, so now it’s in the hands of the voters of Salt Spring,” McIntyre said.

People will be coming at the incorporation issue from both sides, he said, adding there was “a lot of indication” it was time to revisit the topic.

Salt Spring Island Chamber of Commerce spokesman Jeremy Milsom said the organization will be taking a neutral stance on the vote while pointing out some of the concerns faced by residents. He said those include a “fractured” system of governance with several different bodies involved, along with housing, especially for young people.

“We’re having trouble keeping them on the island,” said Milsom,