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Reports say GAMP release next week
Cory Pytlarz
Wednesday May 10, 2006
Cochrane Times — The Ghost-Waiparous Access Management Plan (GAMP) has finally been approved, a local official says.
While Alberta Sustainable Resource Development (ASRD) is remaining tight-lipped on the details, an announcement regarding the plan is expected to be made as early as next week in time for the May long weekend, according to Municipal District of Bighorn councillor Hugh Pepper.
“All I can say is that I asked the deputy minister at a meeting in Edmonton a couple of days ago what was the status of it, and he said it had been approved,” Pepper says.
“This is the end of a lot of work by a lot of people.”
Rick Blackwood, ASRD manager for the southern Rockies division, confirmed the news.
“The plan has been approved, and there will be a formal announcement coming sometime in the next couple of weeks,” he says.
“When the announcement is made all the details will come with it.”
While the finer details on the plan have yet to be revealed, on May 3 cabinet approved the Ghost Forest Land Use Zone, one element of GAMP that sets out various guidelines regarding the use of off-road vehicles, camping and other activities in that zone.
The Ghost-Waiparous area has been a topic of hot debate for nearly 20 years, with various stakeholder groups, including off-highway recreation vehicle users, ranchers and environmentalists, all voicing concerns and preferences regarding the use of the area northwest of Cochrane.
Cochrane-area rancher Darryl Copithorne, who is an advisor for the Alberta Off-Highway Vehicle Association, says he has not seen the plan and is disillusioned with how little stakeholders been involved in the GAMP process at the local level.
“We were supposed to be an integral part of the plan as far as implementation and keeping us apprised of what’s happening,” he says.
“The local ASRD has snuck it through and not even told any of the stakeholders what’s going on.”
A major concern Copithorne and other stakeholders have is user-displacement, he says, where less environmentally sensitive recreational users will leave the Ghost-Waiparous area when GAMP is approved and do damage in other areas where the rules are less stringent.
Instead, Copithorne thinks GAMP should be held off until there are consistent rules across the province, created by the government’s Recreational Corridor Coordinators Committee.
“The recommendations made by pretty much everybody is to put all these things on hold until that committee has done its job,” he says.
“We need a common set of rules across the province….If they don’t hold off on the Ghost thing until that’s done, it’s just going to be a disaster.”
Meanwhile, though Pepper says an announcement is coming soon, he adds users of the Ghost Waiparous area shouldn’t expect major changes right away.
“It’s symbolic at this point,” he explains. “There’s isn’t time to make the actual changes.”
Symbolic or otherwise, Pepper believes the announcement is still a major step in protecting the area watershed, however,
“Symbolically it’s still important to acknowledge that there is a need to regulate use and behaviour in the Ghost-Waiparous watershed area,” he says.
“That’s very important to be able just to have that principle.
“Really it’s the beginning of a whole new phase whereby everybody has to get on board and make the thing work,” he adds.
“That’s really the challenge, to find ways to make this thing work and that’s going to require a continued effort on the part of a lot of people.”
Copithorne thinks this might be a tough sell, however.
“I think they’ve lost a lot of credibility right now by sneaking it through without including their stakeholders,” he says.
“The trust level has kind of got shot all to (heck).”
Source from here:
http://www.cochranetimes.com/story.php?id=229461
