by Eva van Loon

The morning after Powell River’s November hurricane, I stared in disbelief at the brand new laminate floor in my house in Cranberry, as its tenants hopped around in three inches of water.

The unprecedented run-off had topped the two-feet-high pony wall on the bottom storey of the house and flooded the place. Since the house is built on flat land, no home designer would have expected this.

A lot of water ran around the property, looking for a non-existent streambed. Shortly, hardworking City staff arrived to mess around with the sewers and drainage on the two streets. You’re not the only one, they informed me. It’s happening more and more all over town. What can we do, with all that clear-cutting uphill?

You can’t see any lumbering activity from my house; in fact, it’s comfortingly close to big swaths of intact forest. But cutting is planned. The so called Community Forest is just a stone’s throw away, and in other areas trees are wearing ominous ribbons.

The City guys suggested home insurance would take care of this loss. But homeowner, beware! The floor was ripped out and tiled, the walls dried out and refinished, and ruined items replaced, on my dime. Why? Because the “nuisance” of flood waters didn’t emanate from my own land, but from other land. My pipes didn’t back up—someone else’s negligence caused the loss.

As my law partner used to quip, Insurance companies exist NOT to pay you.
Great. That leaves the homeowner with the expensive prospect of starting a Supreme Court lawsuit against anyone and everyone whose negligence might have caused this flood. The City. The logging companies. The province. The neighbors. The Community Forest, perhaps. Fun—for lawyers! The thought of proving that negligence—taking pictures, tramping through the woods and ex-woods, the expert witnesses to be paid—is crushing. It’s easier just to cough up the four thousand.

Again, the little person carries the cost of corporatism. The law’s only remedy? a lawsuit likely to bankrupt the victim.

As I rented blowers and hauled tile, I thought about what the City guys said. I thought about another town tragedy, the rape of Lombardy Avenue a few years ago, affecting run-off in Townsite. Isn’t it obvious? What are we humans—stupid? Just because we’re shorter than the trees surely doesn’t mean we can’t see what’s happening!

Clearly, all the uplands from our community, from Lund to Saltery Bay, are watershed. Clearly, forest is to be preserved first and foremost. Forest is what we are and what we depend on!

When are we going to stop singing the blues about being the Town that Used to Cut Down Trees? Let’s become the Community That Lives Well in the Forest.

Wanted: politicians and lawyers with heart and brains who’ll figure out how to draw down enough legal power to create an effective, cheap system for the little person and the local community to seek redress from any entity whose negligence contributes to this mess.
A way can be found, and it should be a refrain in our nascent Sustainability Charter. Ask your council and MLAs for that new song.