The Sechelt Indian Band and the District of Sechelt are one step closer to securing a community forest tenure for the Coast.
A community forest tenure could mean opportunity for local enterprise and value-added wood for local mills and provide opportunity for locals to pick out specific logs to be used in homes and businesses. Sechelt Indian Band Chief Garry Feschuk and Sechelt Mayor Cam Reid met earlier this week to sign the document that ensures funding to garner local input on what a community forest could look like on the Coast, to research other community forest tenures already granted in B.C. and to develop a detailed business plan for the proposed Sunshine Coast tenure.
The Ministry of Forests has not yet identified the area being considered for a community forest, but Reid expects a decision on the area to be made by the fall.
"It's called a tenure rather than a licence because licences are based on volume and tenures are set areas of land," said Kevin Davie of the Sunshine Coast Forest Coalition.
Sechelt's draft community forest plan was the only one to make it to this stage of the application process, according to Al Mulholland of Community Futures Development Corporation.
"It's because of the quality of the application that was sent in by the Sechelt Indian Band and the District of Sechelt, plus the fact that the province gave a fine letter of recommendation, that the Sunshine Coast will be given a high priority for approval. This was the only application from all over B.C. that was approved for funding," said Mulholland.
The Sechelt Indian Band and the District of Sechelt have been working on getting community forest tenure for about a year and a half.
Now that the grant money is in place, the district and the band plan to create a community forest advisory committee and invite private sectors to partner with the government bodies heading up the application process.
They also plan to do in-depth research on other areas in B.C. that already hold community forest tenures to see what works and what doesn't.
The District of Sechelt and the Sechelt Indian Band are excited to see this project move forward.
"We see this as having great spin-offs for our community. Any money the District of Sechelt gets for this will be put back into the community as a whole," said Reid.
