About 14 years ago, I worked with a group of concerned citizens in Central Saanich to preserve wildlife habitat and corridors.
Even when our group was on the agenda to make a presentation, we felt that we were blocked from council meetings while developers were given a slap on the wrist after clear cutting areas that had been marked for preservation by a dedicated environmental assessment team.
As far as I know, nothing has ever been done in the Central Saanich area to provide wildlife with space and corridors.
Now people are being told that it is illegal to help these animals and that starving them and killing them is the new plan.
Native animals are residents with rights and play a vital part in the ecosystem upon which we all depend.
In North Saanich, people clearcut acres of natural habitat in order to raise a few sheep to kill.
They also allow their cats to roam the neighbourhood killing our swiftly disappearing songbirds even though they are now protected by the federal Migratory Bird Act.
All attempts to uphold the bylaw to protect the birds have been ignored by North Saanich council.
Non-native grey squirrels are also a major threat to both the songbirds and the native squirrels, a threat ignored by both provincial and municipal governments.
Deer that are threatening no other species are now being demonized.
As the summer droughts worsen due to human environmental mismanagement, no municipal council or bylaw is going to tell me that I can’t give water to a dehydrated doe and her fawn on my own private property.
They also won’t tell me that hunters can legally shoot deer on my property.
Unless, of course, they justify their long history of ignorance of the environment and their current lack of compassion for the animals who suffer from it.
Virginia Smith
North Saanich