Editor: I understand that the newspaper needs to print both sides of any issue, but the recent letter “Focus on property rights,” (The Times, April 22), frankly frightened me. Clearly there are many strictly enforced bylaws in place already, which restrict what an owner is allowed to do on their private property. These include the building codes, illegal activities, the amount of people, livestock and pets allowed, junk and chemical storage, garbage dumping and burning. It is certainly not a free-for-all simply because you hold the mortgage.
Trees are essential to the life of the planet and desperately need our protection. They are not a crop which grows back yearly and is harvested and sold for consumption. As for the fire threat, it is ridiculous to compare Kelowna to Langley. The environment and type of trees are completely different.
I beg council to do what’s right and implement a tree law with large fines and strict enforcement for all lot sizes, including acreage. In a perfect world no healthy, mature tree would ever face destruction. Can we not learn from past mistakes and leave a liveable environment for generations to come? Trees provide health benefits, shade, shelter, privacy, bird habitats (many, like owls, woodpeckers and other raptors need large trees) and of course, beauty.
As the old song says, “don’t it always seem to go, you don’t know what you got till its gone.” All of us crazy tree lobbyists need to keep up the fight more than ever, before one of the few remaining “tree paradises” to grace the Lower Mainland is gone forever.
C. Sue,
Langley