The power and the problems associated with social media have clearly been on display in Chemainus during the past week.
As soon as someone posted there was a ‘Private Property – No Trespassing’ sign across the entrance to the Hermit Trail and trees were known to have been taken down in the area, many immediately assumed the development in the area had meant the death of the trails.
As word spread about what was thought to happen, the reaction intensified. Why wasn’t something done to protect the trails? And the list of fuming residents intensified.
Calls and emails went into the Municipality of North Cowichan looking for answers.
The thing social media does not do, of course, is go in search of the facts. That’s what we do first and foremost in the newspaper business before anything is printed.
Consulting with developer Chris Clement was the first step and he confirmed what he has said all along that the trails would not be destroyed.
When he first bought the land, Clement made a provision to protect the trails. In an agreement with North Cowichan when a certain stage of development is reached, the land containing the trails and additional space will be transferred to the municipality for public use.
North Cowichan’s director of planning and building Rob Conway confirmed the proper steps were being taken.
So all that hysteria got stirred up just because there is no control over social media to separate fact from fiction.
The whole story, though, brings up an important point where we are still very much at a crossroads between the need for more housing through development and the protection of the environment.
The Chemainus area has seen a substantial amount of land cleared and you don’t have to look far along the Trans Canada Highway to see it in two major locations. Another to accommodate a modular home project hasn’t even started yet.
Suggestions have been made about redeveloping more sites for housing previously abandoned or utilized for other purposes and that will make a lot of sense in the future, rather than continually clearing more forested land.