I see that not in my backyard is still alive and kickin’ in the Sea to Sky Corridor.
I remember it well; I lived, worked and raised my young children in the corridor for 20 years.
These “man” camps are largely occupied by hard-working men and women who are away from home, working six or seven days a week.
Like any place where people gather in numbers, you will absolutely find a variety of personalities.
I can tell you from experience (working remotely; residing in both large and small camps) that the companies screen and select their tradespeople vigorously and maintain a zero tolerance policy when it comes to their employees behaving poorly out in the communities that are close by.
They spend hard-earned dollars on entertainment, restaurants, pubs, local raffles, golf tournaments to raise dollars for local charities, grocery stores, tourist attractions etc. when they get time off, which isn’t much.
Since Squamish has transitioned from a blue-collar, resource-based logging town (with all manner of low-income through middle to high income) to what it has become today (a bedroom community for Whistler/North and West Vancouver) and has forgotten its foundations.
No gratitude. No appreciation for the working class. Unless, of course, it is construction on a new (sometimes second or third-plus) residence for the elite, entitled or another top-end tourist trap.
The stereotyping, the judgment, the assumptions, and the prejudice are thick and cruel; rude and uncalled for and having lived in that environment for too long, let me fill you in on how that attitude causes yet more fracture and division in a province and country that is struggling to unify and build togetherness.
It is disgusting, hurtful, disrespectful and totally biased. It absolutely destroyed the true essence and character of Whistler, permeated Pemberton years ago, and Squamish is well on its way.
I left for the north. I have no regrets.
I have lived in every region of Canada and never experienced the exclusion or the cliquish attitude like the general population of the Sea to Sky Corridor in the beautiful coastal mountains of B.C.
Do better Squamish.
You are either in or in the way of economic progress in this country called Canada.
Choose wisely; leave the blue collar alone.
They just want to earn their wages and return safely to their lives and their families.
Wendy Hanson
Prince George
