The battle of Baker Beach

SALT SPRING ISLAND, British Columbia (CN) — When Ethan Wilding bought his first property on Salt Spring Island just before the pandemic, he had little idea of the storm that would follow.Six years and three court cases later, his properties have become a showcase of the tensions that trouble the small island — exposing a culture clash between traditional hippie-types and techie newcomers, as well as the challenges in accommodating a growing population.Wilding says the bluff beneath his $4.2-million beach house is eroding. He’s proposed a shoreline restoration project, which local officials oppose.The dispute has led to two court cases, as Wilding and two neighbors argue Salt Spring officials are improperly blocking the project. The latest will be tested in a hearing starting Dec. 17.Though that property has drawn the most controversy, it’s not Wilding’s only court battle with local officials. In a separate case against the North Salt Spring Waterworks District, he’s suing to get a water connection for a second property he bought in 2023 for $1.75 million and converted into a community center.In that case, Wilding is challenging a moratorium on new water service connections as the island’s infrastructure strains to keep up with rapid population growth.The brewing legal fights come as Salt Spring sees more and more new arrivals. In the last 50 years, Salt Spring’s population has nearly quadrupled to around 12,000 even as other rural communities in the United States and Canada have hollowed out.It was once a sanctuary for Vietnam War draft dodgers, and the mix of old hippies and new money has given the island an eclectic feel. Tara Martin, who was born and raised on the island, describes the vibe as “tie-dyes and Teslas.”With all that growth has come problems.Businesses struggle to hire workers as the island’s existing population stretches its water sources. The moratorium on new water connections has stalled much-needed housing, and the result is that housing at a “breaking point,” with homes going for more than $1 million on average.Even so, people want to live here, and it’s no surprise why.One of British Columbia’s Gulf Islands, Salt Spring is part of a lush Pacific Northwest archipelago that also includes the San Juan Islands in Washington state. Although just a couple hours by boat from Vancouver, it feels far removed from the city, embedded in its own corner of the Salish Sea.Salt Spring Island resident Ethan Wilding stands on Baker Beach, below his property, which he believes is open to serious damage from shoreline erosion. (Dustin Godfrey/Courthouse News)Against this backdrop, Wilding’s proposed shoreline restoration project has become a flashpoint. The project would require work on Baker Beach, a local gathering spot.After public notice was posted, concerns grew about the impacts on local habitat, including as a breeding area for ecologically important fish. Residents circulated a petition, and local officials eventually nixed the project.Wilding, whose proposal has been joined by some neighbors, casts the plan as a common-sense measure to mitigate erosion and climate change. If done right, he says shoreline restoration would protect beachfront properties while also preserving recreation space and the environment.As the rain poured down on Baker Beach on a recent weekend, Wilding stood beneath his home, examining the bluffs that have caused such headaches in this community. He grabbed at the soil, which quickly crumbled in his hands.A sliver of Wilding’s home peeked through the trees above. These trees already help mitigate erosion, securing the bluff even as rain pours down into the Salish Sea.Wilding fears that over time, the trees will inevitably be victims of the erosion they help protect against. If they fall, taking part of the bluff with them, it would not only damage his property but could also cause a safety hazard.“People use this beach all the time,” he said. “It’s not unreasonable to assume that [they] might come down and injure somebody quite seriously.”Last year, longtime residents Gillian Kidd and Philip Grange were visiting Baker Beach when they saw a public notice about Wilding’s project at the top of the stairs.After contacting Wilding to learn more, their concerns only grew.Under the proposal, materials would be barged in. An excavator would spread substrate and large rocks.“We’re not very happy with it,” Kidd said. “We thought it was just way too intrusive on the beach.”Working with their friend Debbie Magnusson, the group started an online petition demanding that officials protect the shore. It garnered around 1,500 signatures.On a recent weekend, the trio sat around a clubhouse table at the Salt Spring Island Golf Club, sipping coffee as they discussed the drama. In keeping with the island’s hippie ethos, this place feels more diner than country club.The group stressed they had nothing against Wilding or his neighbors and didn’t often rock the boat. Instead, they felt they had to act to protect Baker Beach.Baker Beach was “like a community center” for the island, Kidd said.“It’s a warm water beach, which is rare on Salt Spring,” she added. “People gather to swim and chat.”From Baker Road, these stairs are the main public access to Baker Beach on Salt Spring Island. (Dustin Godfrey/Courthouse News)Martin says the island’s natural beauty inspired her to pursue a career in conservation, which in turn led her to launch the Conservation Decisions Lab at the University of British Columbia.She understands Wilding’s situation. “I grew up in an area that was really impacted by erosion,” she said. “We had a landslide under the corner of our house one winter and had to call in this emergency crew of neighbors to sandbag.”Even so, Martin says shoreline erosion is a natural process — one that anyone living somewhere like Salt Spring Island must accept.“Irrespective of sea level rise,” she said, “shorelines have been accreting and eroding for as long as they’ve been here.”If Martin is more tie-dye than Tesla, Wilding is the other way around.His background is in blockchain, his LinkedIn filled with titles like “co-founder” and “director.” For a time, he served as resident philosopher at the Ethereum Foundation, starting a year before the Swiss nonprofit launched the Ether cryptocurrency.Despite the island’s tie-dye reputation, Wilding says he increasingly sees himself in the island’s population.“I think it’s getting to be quite vibrant,” he said. “We have a lot of good entrepreneurs and a lot of wonderful products that are created here.”Asked about his work, Wilding doesn’t linger on his tech resume. Instead, he highlights his work at the Wilding Foundation, a charity he started to support STEM and arts initiatives on Salt Spring Island.Wilding still lists Vancouver as his primary residence. And yet his actions here — the charity work, the community center, even the court cases — suggest a man who’s eager to make an impact on the local community.“It’s a beautiful island,” Wilding said. “I’m happy to call it a type of home.”For his shoreline restoration proposal, Wilding was joined by neighbors David Demner and Heidi Kuhrt, who also live on Baker Road and face the same concerns about bluff erosion.He had to get approval from federal regulators and the British Columbia Ministry of Water, Land and Resource Stewardship or WLRS, pronounced “walrus.”In an affidavit from Wilding’s lawsuit, Bradley Fossen, an engineer with the firm Aurora Professional Group who is involved with the project, said WLRS was largely supportive of the plans. Nonetheless, the agency told Wilding it had received 166 public comments, all but a handful negative.Meanwhile, Wilding encountered more resistance at Islands Trust, the municipal-like entity that governs the island. When Islands Trust staff still hadn’t made a decision after well over a year, Wilding took them to court to compel one.Complying with a court order to make a call, officials formally rejected the plan, citing local shoreline development guidelines which discourage creating new land with fill. Wilding then appealed to local trustees, the equivalent of Salt Spring’s city council.With no formal town hall building, trustees hold public meetings in a wooden banquet hall owned by the Royal Canadian Legion, a nonprofit veteran’s group.When they met in July to discuss the plan, it didn’t go well for Wilding.Trustee Jamie Harris expressed concern about a lack of input from local Indigenous communities like the Penelakut Tribe. “At this point, I’m not prepared to be in favour of this today,” he said.In a recording of the meeting posted online, Harris explains that the Penelakut Tribe had shellfish-harvesting rights along Baker Beach. He says some tribal members had complained they were not adequately consulted about the project.The island’s trustees declined to comment for this story, citing the ongoing court fight. The Penelakut Tribe didn’t respond to a request for comment.The head of Baker Road on Salt Spring Island. (Dustin Godfrey/Courthouse News)As for trustee Laura Patrick, she said she didn’t see how a shoreline restoration could avoid impacting Baker Beach’s ecosystem, when so much sediment would need to be brought in.“It’s a lot of it,” she said. “So, I don’t disagree with [staff’s] findings.”Trustee Timothy Peterson, the committee’s chair, took a broader approach, considering the opposition of the local community, the concerns by Indigenous shellfish harvesters, and the decision by staff to reject the proposal based on potential harm to fish habitat.“Taken in aggregate, I do have some concerns about granting an appeal at this point,” he said. In the end, trustees rejected the proposal 3-0.As it exists now, Baker Beach is a rich ecosystem. Eelgrass supports shellfish and geese, while fish populations feed predatory birds like eagles and herons and thus make the beach exciting for birdwatchers.One species of fish in particular — the Pacific sand lance — is a favorite of chinook salmon. Those salmon are in turn eaten by Southern resident orcas, making Baker Beach a relatively important part of the orca food chain.According to a recent survey, there are only 74 Southern resident orcas left. Researchers point to declining chinook salmon populations as a main factor.“So, we have this direct trophic link between sand lance and our most iconic endangered species on the coast,” said Martin, the conservationist and lifelong Salt Spring resident.At the Conservation Decisions Lab, Martin has studied the Pacific sand lance with the aim of helping preserve this majestic ecosystem, including its orcas.One study estimated sand lance could lose more than a third of its current population in around the next 25 years, with shoreline armoring among the key threats facing the fish.According to Martin’s modeling, only about 5.4% of the Salish Sea’s shoreline is suitable for breeding, with Baker Beach having especially high suitability. Although Wilding wants to emulate the natural beach, Martin says it’s very difficult to get the specific substrate right.“Any addition of a different type of substrate is essentially going to make that site unsuitable,” she said, adding there was “zero evidence” that humans could adequately emulate such a delicate intertidal habitat.From Baker Road, these stairs are the main public access to Baker Beach on Salt Spring Island. (Dustin Godfrey/Courthouse News)Baker Beach is also important to another, particularly noisy fish. Visit on an early May night, and you just might hear them.Around that time of year, the plainfin midshipman fish emerges from the deep onto beaches like Baker Beach to breed. The species is named for the bioluminescent beads that line its belly like a ship worker’s coat — but that’s hardly its only defining feature. When males find a suitable location for females to lay their eggs, they emit a sound that’s been described as like a “giant electric shaver.”Asked about it at the Salt Spring Island Golf Club, Magnusson’s, Kidd’s and Grange’s eyes all light up. “The spawning is an extraordinary event,” Magnusson said.As important as protecting fish is, it has no place in the Island Trust’s decision-making, according to Thomas Falcone, Wilding’s lawyer.Just as with cities, the trust’s powers are outlined in provincial legislation. Falcone argues there’s nothing in the law about regulating fish habitat.He says environmental concerns like these are instead the purview of the federal Department of Fisheries and Oceans. And in court filings, he says DFO studied and approved the project.Wilding followed all the right procedures, Falcone argues — and yet local officials improperly axed the project anyways.“It’s quite unfair,” he said in a phone interview.The Department of Fisheries and Oceans did not respond to a request for comment by press time.Naturally, the local trust disagrees with Wilding’s legal argument.In court filings, officials point to a section of the Local Government Act, which they say allows local governments to regulate development to protect fish habitat and riparian areas. They argue DFO never technically approved the project and only responded to a request for review. Finally, they say Wilding has no right to alter Baker Beach, where the shoreline restoration project would actually take place.As a judge hears the case this month, they’ll have the uncomfortable task of wading into the culture clash over the future of Baker Beach.They’ll also have to establish basic facts. Wilding and his consultants say that without shoreline restoration, Baker Beach could see landslides that cause more damage to the ecosystem than what he’s proposing. Opponents say the erosion risk is minimal compared to the potential harms from Wilding’s proposal. They point to a study by Wilding’s consultants that found any landslide risk is contained to the bluff and declared his home itself to be safe.Everyone can agree on one thing: Baker Beach must be protected. It’s a special ecosystem and an important place for the community.Grange, a longtime resident, said the beach holds formative memories for countless children.“You see on that beach generations of little kids coming down and lifting up a rock and watching all the little crabs scramble away,” he said. “We would like that human experience to be something that’s available to the next generation.”Baker Beach seen from the public access stairs on a rainy October day. 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