Management plan in need of a review

On Wednesday night, Jasperites were given the opportunity to take part in the first of many public consultations with Parks Canada in regards to updating the Jasper National Parks Management Plan.

The management plan, made in 2000, was last reviewed back in 2005 and “there wasn’t seen a need for change at that time,” said Sean Cardiff, manager of land use, policy and planning for Jasper National Park.

“We’ll definitely be updating the plan and repackaging it [now],” said Cardiff who suggested the meeting was a time for introducing the management plan review and talking about the next steps and processes to come.

“We’ve completed a state of the park report that informs us on how well we’re doing on protection related issues for ecological and cultural resources and visitor experience and protection and that’s a really key stage to setting out on management plan review,” said Cardiff.

According to Cardiff, while the review aims to build on the strengths of the current plan it also gives Parks an opportunity to look at the direction relating to “visitor experience specifically and look at how we can be more effective at connecting Canadians with their park.”

The meeting aimed to discuss a variety of topics on which Parks would like public opinions and views, including the vision of Jasper National Park, which Cardiff said requires the assistance of people to make it more specific so that it connects better with the unique landscape and cultural stories and the history of the park.

Another key issue for JNP is visitor experience, whereby Parks is working on the building blocks to build new strategies for visitor experience, said Cardiff, who noted that Wednesday’s meeting was just a precursor for a range of consultation with residents and stakeholders as well as Parks’ own “social science work.”

A public update on caribou conservation and recovery was also a key topic of discussion for the meeting along with aboriginal relationships, said Cardiff. “Something that is missing in our current plan is that there was very little involvement of aboriginal people in preparing that plan. We can certainly strengthen it more by involving them in the process and reflecting their interests,” he said.

Those who didn’t make it to the meeting will have another chance. “We haven’t laid it out in detail yet but there will be opportunities to be involved in meetings that focus on specific topics and there will be opportunities to comment directly,” he said. “This is sort of a launch of the public and aboriginal participation process and there will be a number of different kinds of ways to be involved in the coming months.”

With a new website design just about to be unveiled, residents and visitors alike will be given the opportunity to review information that is relevant to them and give feedback directly to Parks Canada.

Those interested in the plan can get background documents by phoning Amber Stewart at 780-852-6147.