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Cyclists take aim at Victoria
Provincial funding will provide more floodlights for soccer fields at West Shore recreation. News, Page A3
Jumpship and Tour de Victoria are back for round two of the city’s international cycling festival. Sports, Page A16
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Friday, April 6, 2012
Anti-graffiti program in Colwood made permanent Kyle Wells News staff
MacIsaac says nurturing a full ecosystem is their biggest project yet. The meadow won’t be completely back to its natural state — MacIsaac plans to erect a tall deer fence around the one acre plot. “We think this is what would exist there naturally. What is great about this national historic site is the military preserved a lot of the ecosystem because it camouflaged the area,” she said. “Fort Rodd Hill wanted to blend in. It didn’t want to take too much down.”
Rather than sitting around watching paint dry, Colwood council has taken action and voted to continue the Graffiti Outreach Program. Initial funding for the initiative was for a six-month pilot project that started in October 2011. With the end of the program falling in the middle of the City’s budget process in April, mayor and council decided to vote on the funding early so that the program can continue uninterrupted. Council voted to have the project placed in the core budget, which should extend the life of the anti-graffiti project indefinitely. The program is budgeted at $31,000 for 2012, rising slowly to $50,397 by 2016. Colwood bylaw enforcement officer Kevin Atkinson said goals for the six-month project were achieved in the first three months and the response from the community has been overwhelmingly positive. Of the graffiti catalogued in Colwood, 80 per cent has been removed. As the weather gets better the remaining graffiti will be also be tackled, Atkinson said. In the first six months of 2011 Atkinson said graffiti damage cost the City more than $10,000 in cleanup costs. In the second half of the year, which saw the introduction of the program, that figure dropped to $1,200. The pilot project itself cost about $20,000, mainly as salary for the part-time anti-graffiti bylaw officer Phil Williams. Atkinson said direct savings to the City, along with the spinoff benefits of the program, make it well worthwhile.
PLEASE SEE: Historic building, Page A6
PLEASE SEE: Restorative justice, Page A4
Edward Hill/News staff
Fort Rodd Hill species at risk officer Susan MacIsaac shows a planter of blue wildrye grass that will eventually be planted in the field behind her. The historic site is trying to create a Garry oak meadow ecosystem on former lawn in the fort.
Fort Rodd Hill returns to nature Ecological history takes shape amid military history Edward Hill News staff
Fort Rodd Hill, a site known for its big guns, scenic views and military history, is digging deeper into its natural history. Fort staff has covered an acre of manicured lawn inside its front gate under a thick blanket of mulch as part of an experiment to revert the field to a Garry oak meadow and woodland. The concept is to bring the
lawn, amid Garry oak trees, back to a roughly natural state as it might have been 200 years ago. It’s a project that started in 2007 and could span nearly a decade — the finished meadow isn’t expected to bloom until at least 2015. “We are hoping by 2015 to have it close to completion, to be restored so it looks like a Garry oak meadow and woodland,” Susan MacIsaac, the Parks Canada species at risk officer at Fort Rodd Hill, who is leading project. “With one acre, visitors can get a good sense of what Garry oak ecosystems are.” MacIsaac, staff and volunteers started growing camas in
2007, and started a full-fledged nursery two years ago with scores of native plants. Garry oak ecosystems are flush with plant and animal life, but are considered endangered on southern Vancouver Island due to development and invasive species. Camas itself takes three or four years to get to planting size. It also takes a few years for lawn grasses to die and for invasive species to be weeded out before native wildflowers, shrubs and grasses take root. Parks Canada staff and volunteers have laboured for years to remove invasive species from Garry oak forests around the historic site, but
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