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COLUMN: Tidying up rogue camping

I n a script right out of Animal Farm, George Orwell’s classic political satire, it appears all visitors to Squamish are equal but some have become less equal than others. We’ll get to the gist of that narrative shortly, but first a bit of history.

In a script right out of Animal Farm, George Orwell’s classic political satire, it appears all visitors to Squamish are equal but some have become less equal than others. We’ll get to the gist of that narrative shortly, but first a bit of history.

In 2007, Climbing Magazine published a prophetic report titled “The Death of Dirtbagging.” Marc Piché, one of the people interviewed for the piece, was a Squamish “car dweller” for several years and is currently the technical director of the Association of Canadian Mountain Guides. 

Piché warned that “a lot of dirtbaggers are trying to live a lifestyle that worked when there were 20 of them hanging around an area and not 200.”  

Last September, notable Squamish climbing advocate and The Squamish Chief columnist Jeremy Blumel said the municipality was maxed out with the influx of curbside campers and residents were getting fed up “by the poor choices being made by these folk, travelling and staying in ever increasing numbers.”  

With that caution in mind, let’s fast forward to this past August when municipal Coun. Peter Kent posted a message on The Chief’s Facebook page about how disgusted he was with people just passing through who were using the town as their personal garbage dump and toilet. He was equally concerned that overworked bylaw officers were “playing cat and mouse with these guys.”

After reading that post, frustrated Squamish resident Tammie Cassettari wrote that she had contacted the bylaw department on numerous occasions with photos of illegal camping and plate numbers. But she was told there was nothing they could do. In response, Kent said she could get more action if the information was sent directly to council, along with a note about how the issue was being handled. 

Shortly after that online exchange, the cat finally pounced. In what Kent called “a concerted focus between staff, council, bylaws and RCMP,” the local constabulary removed 13 vehicles from the Smoke Bluffs parking lot and 25 more from the Squamish Estuary.

Coincidently, about the same time the long-awaited $1.3 million Squamish boundary and wayfaring signage program was launched, the District decided to crack down on vehicular squatters. Tony Bortolotto, who is the proprietor of the Chicago Hair Gallery and a long-time Squamish resident, says he is not surprised. He figures something had to give when the District decided to follow the money by rebranding the town from a blue collar backwater that was a bit ragged around the edges to an aspiring tourist destination. Bortolotto says now that the Sea to Sky Gondola and other attraction are drawing throngs of visitors, unsightly roadside collectives have become a branding liability.

That being said, it remains to be seen if the bylaws prohibiting rogue camping will be consistently enforced from now on, or if this was just a momentary tidying up exercise.  

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