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Years est. 1954
Volume 59 No. 02
Sentinel
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Northern
www.northernsentinel.com
Wednesday, January 8, 2014
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1.30 INCLUDES TAX
Marina fence draws attention to MK future Late in 2013 a fence appeared which separated the north and sound end of MK Bay Marina. The move cleared the Haisla-owned portion of the land used at the marina, and the Haisla Business Operations (HBO) is saying they have plans in motion to develop that land, but they are so far mum on what that could mean. “The nation put up the fence along the northern boundary line of its property, IR #2, for two reasons. Number one, we’re going to be developing that area commercially, and we really needed the infrastructure off our land. And secondary, for safety reasons,” said Clarence Nyce, the HBO’s chief executive officer. He can’t yet explain what project they have, but did say they are commecial plans. He said the marina did get a year’s notice before they proceeded to put up the fence. The now-fenced off area was used for boat and camper parking, as well as parking for project contractors and the general public. “We’ve had a long relationship with the regional district and they utilized our land as well as our water system without interruption for 20-plus years. Plus their septic tank currently sits on our land. We’ve been working together on these items for a number of years, so it’s been a workable relationship for a long time,” said Nyce. “But it’s time for us now to implement those business, commercial ideas that we’ve had brewing and stewing, and with many things moving forward in our area we’re taking advantage of these business possibilities.” The Chair of the Regional District of KitimatStikine’s MK Bay Function Committee (the marina is operated by the regional district) said that the fence wasn’t entirely expected, but added that they weren’t surprised either to see it go up. “It’s their ground, they can do whatever they want,” said Ted Ramsey. However none of these developments have silenced a long-standing desire for the Haisla Nation to outright buy the MK Bay Marina. “We have formed partnerships with various joint-venture partners all over the world. One of these joint-venture partnerships, and the nation, made a presentation to the regional district last December (2012) indicating to them we are interested in purchasing the marina, and those discussions continue,” said Nyce. “We’d certainly love to own the marina so we can bring it up to a level it should be at in relation to becoming a destination stop as opposed to a taxpayer’s burden.” He said any possible purchase of the marina would have to make sure to take care of the boating public and recreational boaters. “The question is how do we fund a world-class marina without incurring the cost that typically drag a marina down. And we think we have that answer.” Continued on page 7
Looking down the Douglas Channel through a fence which was put up late in 2013 to divide the Haisla-owned portion of land from Regional District of Kitimat-Stikine owned MK Bay Marina.
The war on pipelines continues In the days leading up to the Joint Review Panel’s decision on the Enbridge Northern Gateway Pipeline proposal, the Douglas Channel Watch’s Murray Minchin approached Kitimat Council to continue pressing on them to take a stand against the project. “Despite Enbridge’s claims of magical pipelines which never deteriorate, that last indefinitely, and will be as good as the day they first went into service, there are going to be spills, and the effects will be felt for generations afterward if this project is built,” said Minchin in the closing lines of his presentation. Minchin went through numerous claims of Enbridge as to the safety of the
project, from the dangers of the waters around Kitimat to his opinion on the lapses of the company in detecting spills. Among Minchin’s claims are that there could potentially be 33 million litres of oil spilled from a pipeline based on leak detection methods. (That’s based on fly-overs and alarms which Minchin said wouldn’t trigger under 100,000 litres an hour.) Many of Minchin’s questions and claims that he posed to council had earlier been asked at the Joint Review Panel process. And when we asked the company to respond to the claims in Minchin’s latest presentation they pointed to the past discussions for their answers.
On the issue of the potential 33 million litre spill, we were pointed to a transcript from the JRP hearings when Minchin spoke with Northern Gateway’s Director of Pipelines Barry Callele. Callele says that the 33 million litre scenario only takes into account a single leak-detection system, but they have multiple, overlapping methods which would pick up a leak well before it got that far. Using what’s called a volume balance system he said a 417 metres cubed leak would be required to cause an alarm. (A calculation with an online calculator shows 417 metres cubed equals 417,000 litres.) Minchin also drew ref-
erence to an oil spill near Hardisty, Alberta in 2001 which took 14 hours to find. He then pondered how long it would take Enbridge to find a spill in the Upper Kitimat River, under 20 feet of snow. The company again referred to dialogue at the JRP, where Minchin presented a hypothetical scenario of a spill in the Upper Kitimat. The company responded that an emergency shut down would be implemented “to minimize further release,” and that if the spill was not spotted with conventional visual means, “control measures would be deployed at pre-designated control points to protect sensitive areas.” Continued on page 3
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Surviving the channel ... page 7