Sarah Simpson’s articles on Cowichan Fish and Game Club imply that recent arrivals to Glenora are upset about occasional gunfire from the club bothering their afternoon teas.
That is NOT the problem!
Yes, CFGC started over 80 years ago: for local members. Now I understand the club has over 700 members from all over the Island who come because of the laxity of its restrictions. Here shooting is permitted 77 hours a week. Thus nobody within earshot of CFGC can plan an outdoor BBQ, party, wedding, etc., in daylight hours free of noise of artillery.
The “grandfather clause” was raised to defend the club; however, times change, scientific analyses improve. In 2014 B.C. Supreme Court ruled that a gun club had to change with the character of its neighbourhood. This shows that the courts understand that grandfather clauses are no justification for bad practices, but local “wisdom” appears not to.
Ms. Simpson refers to a “group of Glenora neighbours” being bothered. The barrage from CFGC travels much farther than Glenora and is probably worse on the north side of the river.
Don Cadden said that the club had “reduced the days of the week that members can shoot whatever they want”. I’m still hearing gunfire on all seven days of the week.
Apart from the noise pollution, recent studies have shown that the dangers of lead contamination at CFGC site are significant: in some samples 98 times greater than the Contaminated Site Regulation numerical standard. Will lead and all the other contaminants leach into the soil and reach the Cowichan River and get to Duncan’s water supply?
My last point concerns physical danger. If a person supposedly enjoying the Park had been in the wrong place at the wrong time (s)he could have been shot. Bullets have been found embedded in trees outside the CFGC boundary. No other BC park hosts a gun club; possibly there is a reason for that.
What was initially a nuisance has now been exposed as a danger. It is time for CFGC to stop being so intransigent and relocate.
Francine O’Brien
Sahtlam