Counties yanking fishing bylaw

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Counties yanking fishing bylaw

 

 

By NICK GARDINER

Staff Writer

newsfeed.recorder.ca

 

 

A United Counties council committee is pulling the plug on a month-old bylaw banning overnight fishing along roadsides and rights-of-way in its jurisdiction.

 

The public works committee agreed Wednesday to rescind the bylaw imposed by counties council on Dec. 12 under the heading of public safety, but with open acknowledgment it was also aimed at curbing local poaching complaints.

 

Warden Jim Pickard, like his colleagues, brushed off a proposed amendment already prepared for the meeting as well as staff proposals to "tighten up" the bylaw in favour of an absolute withdrawal on the question.

 

"I'm prepared to sign a motion to rescind the bylaw. I would like to just table the whole issue," Pickard told the meeting.

 

He said the OPP has expressed concern about enforcement, especially considering it doesn't have a contract to provide services to the United Counties.

 

He said it wouldn't be realistic to expect individual municipalities to use local bylaw enforcement officers to maintain the fishing ban.

 

"It was well-intended, but it can't be enforced," he said, noting municipalities may apply a local ban as they see fit.

 

Pickard's recommendation was quickly picked up by Rideau Lakes Mayor Ron Holman who was one of several who indicated they have been flooded with public complaints.

 

Holman said he'd heard "many serious and logical concerns" from residents, including tourism operators who feel their business will suffer.

 

During an interview after the meeting, Holman said he's talked with many people who have fished overnight for years alongside counties roads and off bridges and they don't see the need to stop.

 

"They were concerned about changing this tradition. But that wasn't the intent of the bylaw. It was for safety."

 

The bylaw won't be rescinded, he noted, until it passes at the full meeting of counties council on Jan. 24. That should be a formality as all council members also sit on the committee.

 

Meanwhile, Bill Thake, mayor of Westport, said the village will retain the ban on overnight fishing it enacted last month.

 

"We're leaving our bylaw in place," Thake told The Recorder and Times.

 

Thake said he took the village bylaw to the counties last month to ask for its support because the ban includes counties roads and bridges. He reiterated previous comments that he never intended it to become a countieswide bylaw.

 

"I was as surprised as anybody at the time. We never sought a wider restriction."

 

He said village council continues to have concerns about the safety of people fishing at night off bridges and close to the roadside.

 

Otherwise, he said, "it's not going to affect local fishing much because the biggest part (covered by the bylaw) is the fish hatchery, where there's no fishing allowed at all."

 

Complaints about the countieswide fishing ban were also cited by Front of Yonge Reeve Roger Haley who told council he had heard "some legitimate concerns" raised by residents.

 

Haley also questioned the OPP's willingness or ability to enforce the bylaw.

 

Chief administrative officer Steven Silver noted the bylaw provided no penalties and suggested "a more narrow wording" could satisfy some concerns.

 

Director of public works Les Shepherd said he, too, had received letters, e-mails and phone calls opposing the ban and also suggested rewording the bylaw to more closely reflect safety concerns about fishermen standing on bridges or too close to the roads.

 

But Shepherd's suggestion that counties lawyer John Simpson be brought in to examine the proposed bylaw was rejected by past warden Doug Struthers, who endorsed Pickard's call to rescind the regulation.

 

"We don't need to have our solicitor vet the bylaw," said Struthers.

 

Councillor Frank Kinsella said he supported the original bylaw to address the situation of illegal fishing and not to interfere with local sportsmen.

 

"Our intention was to give us something in our arsenal to address poaching."

 

Concerns about illegal fishing have been raised for years along the Rideau Canal waterway, but enforcement from the Ministry of Natural Resources has been seen as inadequate.

 

That sentiment was reinforced with last fall's release of a report by Ontario auditor general Jim McCarter who decried the ministry's chronic underfunding and inability to enforce hunting and fishing regulations.

 

In recent years, Canadian-Asian anglers have been assaulted around Peterborough, on Lake Simcoe and in the Westport area, leading to a preliminary report issued from the Ontario Human Rights Commission which states the incidents are the result of racism.

 

However, some anglers argue the assaults have resulted from frustration over the MNR's inability to prevent poaching involving Canadians of Asian descent.