How one group is trying to protect the rugged coast off Burgeo
Steering committee wants Sandbanks Provincial Park and surrounding ocean designated nationally
The sun beams down on the rocks. Many people have clothes on the line on this rare, hot September day in Burgeo, N.L.
But Barbara Barter isn't outside enjoying the warm weather.
She's in a conference room, reviewing maps of the study area for the proposed South Coast Fjords national marine conservation area.
"We are surrounded by water, and salt water, at that," said Barter, who heads the local steering committee.
"That has been the lifeblood of the people. It's important to save it for them and for those that come after us."
For 23 years, Barter has been pushing for this federal designation to preserve and protect the rugged coastline and marine life surrounding Burgeo and other communities, stretching from McCallum to La Poile, that dot the southern Newfoundland coast.
The proposed area spans 9,000 square kilometres and includes the popular Sandbanks Provincial Park, which could possibly become a national park under this new designation.
The waters are a key migration route for over 20 species of whales and home to cod, redfish, leatherback sea turtles, dolphins sharks and seabirds.
A national designation could bring enhancements to the provincial park and its beaches, like new visitor centres and national research studies.
Barter believes the title under Parks Canada could provide new forms of industry that could support the people who live here and may attract new people to an area grappling with a shrinking population.
"It can be a very prosperous community, so the idea that we would just let it die, I do not think that is good enough," she said. "I do not think that is fair to the people who spent most of their lives here."
Her decades-long push for change is finally seeing some movement.
The proposed project now in the feasibility study stage. Parks Canada representatives, along with officials from the provincial government, Miawpukek First Nation, Qalipu First Nation, and the Town of Burgeo, are holding public town halls in all the coastal communities falling within the proposed conservation area.
"Right now, very little would change. We are working really hard to make sure the traditional way of life will be ... continued," said Melissa Mills, the community project facilitator with the Town of Burgeo.
Mills says residents will still be able to access their cabins, pick berries, hunt moose and fish. The biggest barrier, she says, comes from big industry, not the community itself.
"We are really working with our stakeholder engagements to talk with these companies, these organizations to be able to work together in the name of conservation, where we can still have that balance between economy and conservation," Mills said.
Parks Canada is currently seeking public feedback on the proposed project.
All parties involved will have to agree on the final boundary for the area that needs protecting before Parks Canada can designate it.
After more than two decades of work, Barter is cautiously hopeful.
"We're moving. So, you know, I feel good about that," she said.
"We see a light. And what that will turn out to be at the end of the tunnel, you know, we don't know. But it's certainly a more positive feeling than when we started 20-odd years ago and were hearing [no] as the answer."
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