Kevan Bracewell was part of the creation of the Lillooet Land and Resource Management Plan (LLRMP) which lasted from 1995 to 2004. The creation of South Chilcotin Mountains Park which was the Spruce Lake Protected Area before took 10 years of planning, facing opposition from other industries such as mining or logging. Even though tourism and mining made an agreement which resulted in government giving the miners 15,000 hectares of what is now South Chilcotin Mountains Park, the mining industry and the communities are not completely satisfied.<\/p>\n
The first proposal for the South Chilcotin Mountains Park was made in 1937 by the Vancouver Natural History Society. In 1980 the NDP was pressured to create protected areas and in 1995 the process for the LLRMP started. Kevan Bracewell and two partners bought the Chilcotin Holidays Guest Ranch in the early 90s. Even though tourism was not included in the planning of the LLRMP for the first two years, Kevan Bracewell and one partner still attended every meeting until they earned their own chair on the table to represent wilderness tourism interest. In 2001 the Liberals however rejected the NDP Park Plan and a letter-writing campaign was started, expressing the need to maintain the natural resources of the land such as the unique geology, grasslands, range lands, lush alpine meadows, grizzly habitat, abundant wildlife and much more that is also important to wilderness tourism. The mining interests dropped out of the planning process after tourism joined. Results from an analysis were presented stating that tourism grows by 10% annually in South Chilcotin and that tourists from all over the world will spend more than $10-million in the region per year. Jim Johnson, a former B.C. government statistician, even argues that the gross domestic product of tourism is exceeding logging and mining.<\/p>\n
The South Chilcotin Mountain Park borders Big Creek Park which results in 122,500 hectares of provincial park. Mining joined the LLRMP planning process again, agreeing that the mining areas that are located inside the park are not the most lucrative.<\/p>\n
Kevan Bracewell is concerned about the eco-system and the wildlife populations in the area. Kevan has also overseen a study about grizzly bears, collecting hair samples and wildlife sightings for over 14 years. The scenery is also important for the wilderness tourism industry and mines would introduce more roads which would impact the scenery extensively.<\/p>\n
The finished LLRMP was never signed by the government and tourism and mining had to come up with a private agreement about dividing the region. The communities still think that the mining industry will stay as strong as it is now, however, major environmentalist groups don’t accept the reduced area of the South Chilcotin Mountains Park. The Green Party states that wilderness tourism has the highest value to the community and that the present government will change their mind sooner or later and realize that the reduction of the park area was not in their best interest.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Kevan Bracewell was part of the creation of the Lillooet Land and Resource Management Plan (LLRMP) which lasted from 1995 to 2004. The creation of South Chilcotin Mountains Park which was the Spruce Lake Protected Area before took 10 years of planning, facing opposition from other industries such as mining or logging. Even though tourism […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"parent":15,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kevanbracewell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/61"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kevanbracewell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kevanbracewell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kevanbracewell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kevanbracewell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=61"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.kevanbracewell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/61\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":62,"href":"https:\/\/www.kevanbracewell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/61\/revisions\/62"}],"up":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kevanbracewell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/15"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kevanbracewell.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=61"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}