Management

Current management of public lands in Alberta, including access and sales, lacks adequate public participation and is based largely on the needs and desires of industry, residential development, and motorized recreation users rather than on ecological principles and scientific research. Albertans are becoming increasingly concerned about such issues as water quantity and quality, cumulative effects of human activity, and loss of wilderness and wildlife habitat. The government’s management of public lands must change to address those concerns.

Public lands belong to all Albertans and are held in trust and managed by our elected representatives. These lands contain some of Alberta’s largest, most intact wilderness areas, watersheds that contain the headwaters of rivers that supply fresh water to all of three prairie provinces, and many of Alberta’s rare and endangered species. AWA believes that the following principles should apply in the management of these public lands (from A Review of Public Land Policy in Alberta, British Columbia, the United States and New Zealand, AWA position paper, 2005):

• Public land should be managed according to an ecosystem-based management model that makes ecological needs primary and other uses secondary.
• Public land should be managed with the goal of retaining the current base of public land in perpetuity.
• A public decision-making process regarding public land should be meaningful, accessible, and enshrined in legislation.
• Public access to public land should be improved by either eliminating the need to obtain permission from grazing leaseholders or by making the process of obtaining permission less cumbersome.
• Public land management principles and tools should be included in clear, meaningful, and enforceable legislation.

AWA believes that public lands management should include the following priorities (AWA position paper, 1987):

• Establishing a comprehensive network of protected areas and thus securing the habitats of rare and threatened species, unique ecosystems, and representative ecosystems
• Developing interagency (at all government levels), industry, and public cooperation and participation in wilderness conservation
• Reviewing and strengthening legislation concerning protected areas to provide them with permanent status and to secure their objectives against compromise
• Reviewing and improving the organization, funding, and staffing of government agencies responsible for conservation; providing adequate finances and staff, even in periods of economic stringency
• Reviewing and strengthening training and education at the professional, technical, and user levels
• Promoting research to improve the management of protected areas
• Promoting local support through education, revenue sharing, participating in decisions, complementary development schemes adjacent to the protected areas, and access to resources
• Undertaking environmental education and interpretation programs concerning conservation and ecosystem resources to emphasize the social and scientific values of protected areas
• Evaluating the level of public support for protected areas and identifying the nature of public concerns about protected areas
• Establishing more sensitively managed areas and management regimes along the borders of protected areas to prevent them from becoming biologically impoverished islands
• Encouraging those responsible for protected areas research, planning, management, and education to fully investigate and utilize the traditional wisdom of communities located near protected areas and to implement collaborative management arrangements between protected areas authorities and local communities