{"id":339,"date":"2020-08-02T22:23:00","date_gmt":"2020-08-02T22:23:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/legislatekindness.com\/?p=339"},"modified":"2021-12-18T22:54:25","modified_gmt":"2021-12-18T22:54:25","slug":"the-long-and-over-reaching-arm-of-the-bc-conservation-officer-service","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/legislatekindness.com\/index.php\/2020\/08\/02\/the-long-and-over-reaching-arm-of-the-bc-conservation-officer-service\/","title":{"rendered":"The Long and Over-reaching Arm of the BCCOS"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Bear Family fleeing Conservation Officers July 30, 2019<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

On the afternoon of July 30, 2019 a Conservation Officer Service truck arrived in the Coquitlam neighbourhood of Sumpter Drive and Baker Drive. Susan Flint was on her phone when she heard a commotion, someone shouting \u201cBear! Bear!\u201d and looked out her window to see armed men on her property. Four Conservation Officers had descended on Sumpter Drive carrying shotguns.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A mother bear with her two small cubs was running down their street, evading the men. The COS later stated that the bears were \u201cnot co-operating.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When Tony Faccin went out his door, where his two young sons were playing, he saw four officers \u201crunning like crazy with shotguns.\u201d He watched one of the officers trip, and shouted \u201cDon\u2019t shoot, asshole, kids are around.\u201d He walked to the road and started filming the chaos on his street while his wife took their children inside. Soon four RCMP vehicles arrived and a helicopter was circling overhead. At that time Tony stopped filming.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As the Conservation Officers pursued the bears to Baker Drive, Tony was handcuffed and taken to a nearby RCMP car. An officer uncuffed him and asked to see the video he had taken. Tony complied. Another officer grabbed the phone from his hand. Tony now realizes that it was a ploy to get him to unlock his phone. While in the back seat he heard several shots. It was over for the bear family.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Susan began to walk back to her house after Tony\u2019s arrest and was followed by a police officer. He physically grabbed her and demanded her cell phone. She was also handcuffed and put in a waiting RCMP car for 20 to 30 minutes. She had not taken any videos.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A third neighbour was arrested, but has to date not spoken of his experience. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Bear family that was killed July 30, 2019, taken by a neighbour<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Susan said she felt the bears had no voice, and she didn\u2019t want them shot by \u201caggressive\u201d Conservation Officers when she followed the officers at a distance, shouting at them \u201cDon\u2019t shoot the bears.\u201d \u201cThey were pumped with adrenaline,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the sight of armed men on his street where children are out of school on summer vacation and could be anywhere in the neighbourhood, Tony said \u201cThe officers were all fired up, ready to hunt bear. With kids around.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Both Tony and Susan made a point of bringing up the fact that construction on Como Lake Road has resulted in the closing of the area between Mundy Park and the ravine where the bear family was shot.  Tony says \u201cThat\u2019s where they lived, between the lake and the ravine. Because they couldn\u2019t get across the road they had to use yards.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As of this writing the Conservation Officer Service is still holding Susan and Tony\u2019s cell phones. \u201cI\u2019m not afraid to show that video,\u201d said Tony. \u201cThey may be, but I\u2019m not.\u201d CBC, CTV and Global News have purchased Tony\u2019s video and their lawyers are working to have the cell phones released.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One BC resident who is very familiar with bear behaviour and with the provincial wildlife management model is Jefferson Bray. He has lived in Bella Coola for fifteen years alongside black and grizzly bears, without a single negative incident. He has used common sense on his property, neither romanticizing nor fearing the animals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He feels the COS should be giving out hefty fines \u201cbefore bears find our crap lying around,\u201d something he doesn\u2019t see happening in the Bella Coola valley. \u201cTheirs is a reactive, killing model that doesn\u2019t make anyone safer. Quite the contrary they ensure conflict and violence. Yes, get the food cleaned up. For those that don\u2019t, fine them and make them. That\u2019s why they\u2019re an \u2018enforcement\u2019 agency, for people behaviour.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Bella Coola black bear, photo Jefferson Bray<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Over-fishing, commercial berry picking, off-road recreation, resource extraction and widespread housing developments have put ever-increasing pressure on BC wildlife. Their behaviour is changing for their own survival, adapting to a confusing and fast changing world is necessary for them. They are doing their part, let\u2019s do ours\u2019 by holding the Conservation Officer Service to their mandate of human wildlife conflicts prevention<\/strong> so their response isn\u2019t most often lethal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Our relationship with wildlife that interface with urban areas is changing as the public becomes more educated. It\u2019s time for the BCCOS to overhaul the out-dated and unscientific Matrix that they follow regarding bear encounters. The bears, and the public, deserve better.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On the afternoon of July 30, 2019 a Conservation Officer Service truck arrived in the Coquitlam neighbourhood of Sumpter Drive and Baker Drive. Susan Flint was on her phone when she heard a commotion, someone shouting \u201cBear! Bear!\u201d and looked out her window to see armed men on her property. Four Conservation Officers had descended […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":340,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_et_pb_use_builder":"off","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[8,6],"tags":[19],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/legislatekindness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/339"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/legislatekindness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/legislatekindness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/legislatekindness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/legislatekindness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=339"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/legislatekindness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/339\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":346,"href":"https:\/\/legislatekindness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/339\/revisions\/346"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/legislatekindness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/340"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/legislatekindness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=339"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/legislatekindness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=339"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/legislatekindness.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=339"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}