Effectively Saving Green Space?

So the question arises as to whether or not Canada or the United States should be attacking Libya?. And it occurs to me that Obama has always wanted to get out of Afghanistan, get out of Iraq and focus on job creation at home. Still waiting for that great infrastructure rebuild of America. Harper may have bet on the wrong strategy to gain a Majority government 'worthy of his name' ;-|

Meanwhile, here on Salt Spring Island we have an Islands Trust that is running an autocratic self-proclaimed local governance with no officially sanctioned democratic opposition and no recourse to appeal their decisions. Sound like the structure of most middle east Arab countries? Talk amongst yourselves.

So is it just a coincidence that on March 11, 2011 an earthquake and tsunami hits Japan on the same day the Island's Trust votes our Salt Spring Trustees a 120% pay raise? No, just classic observable syncronicity. In my opinion Trust decisions have created their own tsunami of public resentment and a corresponding community climate change we have not seen since the 60's.

They are an outdated remnant of 1970s thinking, born out of a shrill NDP socialism and misguided paranoia of how progress might change the Gulf Islands. And as long as Trust followers continue to demonize people for simply voicing fundamental opinions about this facade of governance, they will be responsible for the divided community dialogue.

Most Salt Springers know the reality and that is that non-profit organizations like the Salt Spring Island Conservancy have long been far more effective in preserving and protecting more acres of green space than the Islands Trust has ever done. That will hardly change, even with the Trust's new 2011 budget of over $6.85 million.

The Conservancy is by and large more effecient with dollars, supported by public funds and donations, they continue to be the prime force behind our growing Parks system. They have a believable "preserve and protect" strategy, something The Islands Trust does not. For all the millions of tax dollars spent on their bureaucracy they've barely managed to buy or save a single acre of land or protected anything of any significance.

Unless of course, its their own existence, but then who couldn't with that kind annual budget? They really appear to use our tax dollars against us and if we dare challenge them, they hand out extra $15,000 bonuses to beef up their propaganda machine. This is the kind of extremism we need to expose and challenge regularly, we have a right, as Canadians to speak out when we see such waste and unfairness even at the local level.