WL Council & 'New Prosperity' Support Motion

At their Jan 29th, 2013 Committee of the Whole meeting - Williams Lake City Council received two letters; one from the TNG (Chilcotin Nat'l Gov't) and one from the Fish Lake Alliance both expressing their disappointment of Council's support for 'New Prosperity', notwithstanding their 'conditional support' motion in Sept 2012.  Read the TNG letter here and Fish Lk Alliance letter here

Council also dealt with the issue of seeking 'Interested Party Status' at the Fed Review Panel for New Prosperity, in order that WL Mayor Kerry Cook could speak, on behalf of the City, whenever the Review Panel's work gets underway in 2013.  City of WL's General Manager of Planning and Ops, Geoff Goodall, indicated that 5 minutes will not be enough time but the City is just hoping to get a speaking slot

Read the Williams Lake Tribune article below:

WL Trib Jan 29th Article as Amended 

As noted in the article - several Councillors made curious statements:

Zacharias - Council was elected to speak on all issues
Bonnell - Council should ask the (Federal) Minister of Aboriginal Affairs what steps have been taken to ensure adequate consultation has taken place
Walters - We're (WL Council) doing a dance, it's not properly addressing it and can you change your 'support' (from conditional to outright support "New Prosperity"

With all due respect to Councillors Sue Zacharias and Ivan Bonnell....

Councillor Zacharias did vote in favour on the clearly 'conditional support' for 'New Prosperity' by way of it passing federal/provincial environmental laws/regulations and that local First Nations are adequately consulted.  And while she is entitled to change her mind, she should clearly know that First Nations never likely to support "New Prosperity"

As far as Councillor Bonnell goes - he should know the current process focuses on an environmental review and the federal Department of Aboriginal Affairs, at this point, plays no role as far as the Federal Review Panel and its' work goes

Finally - Councillor Laurie Walters clearly earned her pay with her comments by challenging Council to address the questions of support posed by the TNG and the Fish Lake Alliance

Conclusion: As I've said previously - the best that Williams Lake City Council should have done is take a neutral stance, from an official point of view, and then argument for or against the project as private citizens, just the Cariboo Regional District Board has done...

SBF