Consultation by sticky note

It’s Day 4 of the Yukon government’s five-day open house on the Peel land use plan and the walls are slowly filling up with flip chart pages plastered with colourful sticky notes.

There's more than 80 individual comments so far. Most are brief statements. Some are questions.  Few of them are signed. And by far the vast majority favour the plan and protection.

Here’s a smattering:

• “We want to hear from you.” That’s insulting to the six years of consultation I and thousands of others participated in.
• Creating new land use designations that misuse the word “wilderness” is obfuscatory.
• It bothers me that the difference between RUWA [Restricted Use Wilderness Area] and IMA  II [Integrated Management Area II) is essentially indistinguishable.
• Shut up and protect the Peel.
• Is the plan to “consult” until we give up?
• How will the final decision-makers be accountable to the consultation process?
• You say “We want to hear from you.” Well you’re hearing from me and I say protect the Peel.
• Let’s open up the area so all Yukoners have access.
• I believe all Class One QM [Quartz Mining] activity should require a permit.
• I am enormously frustrated by the waste of taxpayers’ money this new process involves. The original plan should be maintained.
• Adopt the original Final Recommended Plan.
• I support the commission’s Final Recommended Plan. The concept plans provide no protection.
• The Peel is one of the last places on the planet not harmed (mostly) by resource and other human developments.
• Respecting the UFA [Umbrella Final Agreement] does not mean giving FNs [First Nations] everything they ask for.
• Why is the Final Recommended Peel Watershed Land Use Plan not being adopted?
• Why is there no mention of linear density allowance for RUWA [Restricted Use Wilderness Area] or RUWA corridor. This is critical information.
• Restricted Use Wilderness Areas allowing roads will destroy wilderness. These new designations are misleading and untransparent. I support the Final Recommended Plan as the only plan for the Peel.
• There’s more to these areas than money. Some land must remain pure and untouched.
• Let Yukon residents have their input measured. A referendum is democratic.
• This area deserves the protection set out by the Peel planning commission. For the plan to change shows no respect for the democratic process that created it, to say nothing of the values of the Yukon FN who supported the planning commission.
• My value (for this region) is trust, that people negotiate in good faith, so that people can trust the governmental process. This is the most basic value that has been violated by this government so many times. You have not stated your intentions during the election. This is not good faith. Now you try to inform again! Shame on you.