...Continued from Part One

Tom Rutherford says the agreement follows three years of government-to-government discussions.

“This will be the first crack at developing a watershed sustainability plan,” says Rutherford, who will serve an advisory role in the planning process. “Everybody in the Cowichan Valley can see that we’re not in a good place right now. This process binds us all together, government, farmers, citizens, First Nations. But it’s one thing to make a plan, and another thing to implement it.”

In the big picture and in watershed terms, the Koksilah is small. Fed by five small creeks, the Fellows, Kelvin, Patrolas, Howie and Glenora, the watershed is roughly 300 square kilometres in size, barely larger than the City of Kamloops. And it is just one of thousands of watersheds in the province. In a perfect world, the Cowichan Valley will set a template for how we live, work and do business in a watershed. The status quo is a recipe for failure, but Rutherford believes people are ready to reexamine their relationship with water. Sometimes it takes an event that strikes viscerally to the heart of what it means to be a British Columbian to instigate change, like the sad sight of dead salmon floating to the surface of a river cooked by yet another heat wave.

“I think we can learn from the Cowichan Tribes who have lived here for thousands of years. They don’t look at water as a resource. They look at it as a member of the family. That might sound weird to some people, but I believe there’s something in that sensibility,” Rutherford says.

There’s one inescapable fact that binds us all—everyone and everything lives in a watershed—and with that comes a shared responsibility. If we fail in that responsibility, it will be at our peril.

https://www.bcmag.ca/the-future-of-water/