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Support for temporary stumpage suspension
By Kathy O'Reilly, North Island Eagle, April 25 2025
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The Regional District of Mount Waddington has thrown its support behind a call to temporarily suspend stumpage fees to combat American tariffs.
“We know that our resource-based industries are facing a challenging time, especially with the tariffs that have come in,” said Port Hardy Mayor Pat Corbett-Labatt at the Regional District of Mount Waddington board of directors meeting April 15.
“One of the ideas that came up was for the Regional District to support the deferral of stumpage fees, which is much like they did during COVID,” Corbett-Labatt said.
Stumpage is the price private companies pay for the right to harvest timber on Crown land in British Columbia.
The amount of stumpage paid is based on the timber volumes, species and grades reported and the stumpage rates timber.
The money raised by stumpage fees is used to fund social services such as education and health care and is sometimes shared with First Nations communities.
“We know that forestry is really going to be hit hard, so I am wondering if there is any appetite to write a letter of support to the Ministry of Forests, copied to the Premier (David Eby) from the Regional District saying that we would support helping our forest industry. That it is a big part of our communities and we support the deferral of stumpage fees,” Corbett-Labatt said.
The motion was approved.
Port Alice Mayor Kevin Cameron wondered if a deferral would result in even higher US tariffs in retaliation.
“I think it’s worthwhile and valuable that we make these comments and encourage these things, but of course the province still has to decide to do it,” said Chair Andrew Hory.
“It is a good point,” Hory said of Cameron’s remarks.
“It ties to softwood lumber. In the States it is mostly private land. In British Columbia it’s mostly public land,” responded Rural Resident Attraction program coordinator and Forester Megan Hanacek to a question from the audience.
“The US has said that we’re subsidizing our forest industry by not having a proper market-based system, so they set up BC Timber Sales around 2003/04. You have different business areas, and you set your market pricing areas and stumpage by business area and then that’s the stumpage that was the negotiation,” Hanacek said.
“We have a market-based system to try to appease the Americans because they were feeling that there were certain costs, like silviculture obligations, and road building, they wanted dealt with with a market-based system,” she said.
“It’s a potential method of just reducing the immediate cost so they can maybe stay in business,” said Hory.
The forest industry is looking at about a 60 per cent cost to send lumber to the US if tariffs go ahead as threatened.
“It would really impact the forest industry, so this is temporary measure to try to help the companies,” Hanacek said.
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The Village of Alert Bay had the opportunity to hear from three of six election hopefuls at a forum April 13.
Board discusses funding for mental health care
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By Kathy O'Reilly, North Island Eagle, April 25 2025
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Should elected officials receive coverage for mental health care?
The topic was discussed at a recent Association of Vancouver Island and Coastal Communities (AVICC) convention and brought forward by way of resolution due to a degradation in the tone of civil discourse.
At the Regional District of Mount Waddington board of directors meeting April 15, Port Hardy Councillor Dennis Dugas said, “When I first read it (the resolution), I thought it was going to be a slam dunk. I thought this made sense, we should do this,” Dugas said. “But in the debate, it was quite split and when they had a vote, I think it was like 63 and 67. It was only a few votes difference but it actually got defeated and I was quite surprised because I think that everybody should have an opportunity in situations to get help and get the support they need. I think it’s very important,” said Dugas.
The conference’s plenary speaker Eli Mina, a professional meeting facilitator, felt that people that are elected officials are not employees, per se, and do not have access to support when they are dealing with situations that could cause stress and trauma.
During his hour and a half presentation, Mina said “we have to look at the root causes of this and how can we help people to manage this, so they don’t get in a situation where they feel that they’re struggling to try to deal with situations in a political role,” he continued.
Some of the delegates had a suck it up buttercup approach - “that’s the way it is. That’s what you signed up for,” Dugas continued.
“I think they should have an opportunity to get help. I think that’s something that shouldn’t be dropped and it should be something that should be discussed” at all levels of government.
“I was surprised by that debate as well, frankly, because I did think also it was going to be an automatic,” said Board Chair Andrew Hory.
“I think we’re pretty lucky up here. We do have some negative exchanges occasionally with our representative body politic, but some of the stories we were talking about earlier are really quite heinous. That’s a heck of a lot of stress and it certainly will have a cumulative effect,” Hory said.
When the resolution was being discussed, “I heard around my table you can pay for it yourself, and I thought, okay, we struggle to get people to come into this role because our stipends are low and you’re saying they need to pay for it from this stipend,” said Port Hardy Mayor Pat Corbett-Labatt.
“Everybody’s in a different tax bracket, their backgrounds are different, so don’t make assumptions that everybody can afford to pay for it themselves,” Corbett-Labatt said.
“I was really surprised to hear that comment,” she said.
The Coal Harbour Fire Department has a minor budgetary item that is an assistance fund ($300 after one year of service) where members can have some of their non-medical expenses covered.
Something similar could be adopted by municipalities, said Hory.
“If it is of interest, we could do it locally, or at least have staff explore the possibility,” Hory said.
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Photo —Submitted
Mental health coverage for elected officials was discussed at the Regional District of Mount Waddington board of directors meeting April 15. or