The mayor of Lake Cowichan is worried about growing divisions in the small community, where many are employed in forestry, as the area sees an influx of activists protesting old-growth logging.
As of Friday, police have made 137 arrests of protesters trying to prevent logging in a remote area near Lake Cowichan over the course of almost two weeks of daily enforcement. Those arrested are being processed and released from the Lake Cowichan RCMP detachment.
Mayor Bob Day said protesters who have been released are being met by large groups of supporters, and they’re gathering in a parking lot close to retail businesses and apartments. Neighbours have complained about noise late into the evening, he said.
Day is worried about reports that more activists are heading to the area from other parts of the province to join blockades in the Caycuse watershed in an attempt to block logging.
“There’s places to make policy and change policy, and it isn’t out in the forest where people are trying to make a living,” he said. “It isn’t in communities that are accepting of that. Don’t bring the war here, please.”
Day said while he’s not aware of any altercations between activists and the town’s residents, he’s seeing growing division on social media and worries things might escalate.
He’s asking for visitors to respect residents and for everyone to remain peaceful. “Please respect each other’s opinions and have conversations. But I don’t want to see a conflict, and that’s what scares me. I’m frightened for people on both sides.” Forestry is a “big part” of the town’s history and continues to employ many people in the area, Day said. “That’s what brought life here. And that’s what really is still a mainstay.”
Police have set up exclusion zones for protesters and are trying to clear people from the area to make way for Teal Jones to begin logging. People refusing to leave the area have been arrested.
Activists in the forest are using creative tactics to slow police down and prevent logging, including a move called the “sleeping dragon,” which involves someone putting their arm through PVC piping and handcuffing themselves to something. In one instance, protesters dug a hole and a man lay face down on the ground underneath a truck, with his arm handcuffed to a steel bar at the bottom of the hole and surrounded by PVC piping. Concrete was poured to fill in the hole, said Rainbow Eyes, an activist who used the technique to lock herself to another person last week.
Dozens of people have agreed to lock themselves to objects to slow down police and industry, attaching themselves to gates and even the inside of a massive slab of old-growth, she said.
“There’s a line of people at the camp that are willing to do this to stop industry from cutting down the old-growth forests,” she said.
Rainbow Eyes said police are becoming more physical when they make arrests and used a helicopter to remove someone from a platform suspended from trees.
Mounties arrested four people Friday, including three on platforms suspended from trees, as they continued to enforce a court injunction on behalf of logging company Teal-Jones in the Caycuse and Fairy Creek watersheds. Police also found three people in the woods who were escorted out without charges.
Meanwhile, protesters also gathered outside Premier John Horgan’s Langford office to call on the province to protect old-growth forests from logging.
Environmentalist David Suzuki has joined a chorus of voices calling on the province to step in to prevent old-growth logging.
“In 2021, there’s no justifying cutting down ancient forests. As arrests continue, we call on Premier [John Horgan]
to break his silence on the old growth logging dispute and present a solution that involves dialogue, not handcuffs and chainsaws,” his foundation wrote on Twitter.
Blockades that went up last August were intended to prevent Teal-Jones from building a road into its planned cut block in Tree Forest Licence 46. The company has said the months-long blockades have jeopardized hundreds of jobs, including those of loggers and millworkers.
