Regarding the shooting of a bear near the Garibaldi Way in the Garibaldi Highlands on April 20: Firing a firearm in the middle of a residential neighborhood is dangerous and strictly illegal and puts the residents at risk, whether they are inside their houses or not.
I find it incomprehensible that someone who probably lives in my neighbourhood would kill an innocent animal like this, an animal that has done nothing wrong and was looking for food in its original habitat.
Squamish residents have come a long way in avoiding bear conflicts by locking their garbage bins and minimizing other attractants, and it seems to work well, as people have shown awareness and responsibility towards the nature we have chosen to live in.
When the time comes that we want to live in a sterile environment without bears and wildlife around us, it will be a sad time, and those who want to should rather live in a congested large city, not our town of Squamish, which we chose for the outdoors and the lifestyle.
The person who shot that bear took part of my environment and living nature away from all of us, and in the process, shot an innocent animal and put us all in danger as well.
In this day and age, this should not happen and we all should do our part not to let it happen again. Yes, existing laws and political decision-making are much to blame. While about 90 per cent of the population in B.C. opposes trophy hunting, the government still promotes it, even in many provincial parks, which most of us think are for the protection of landscapes and the animals living there.
One big paradox is that the proposed Garibaldi at Squamish ski resort project is required by the government to do studies for the protection of the bear population, while at the same time hunters are encouraged by the same government to hunt and kill these bears, exactly in the same area. With a bag limit of two per person, it will not take long to make those studies obsolete.
My family and I chose to live in Squamish much because of the bears and other wildlife in our backyard and elsewhere, and no person with his rifle has the right to take that away from us and put us in harm’s way in the process. There are very few places in the world like Squamish, surrounded by nature, so let’s make an effort to keep our beauty of nature, and not accept that individuals with guns can ruin that.
Why is it that we think that we have all the rights in the first place, and bears and other animals that have lived here long before even the First Nations people, have none? Why are they used as moving targets for people that have no respect for their surroundings? This is just not right!
As one of my friends says, there would be far fewer bear hunters if the animals could shoot back.
Eivind Tornes
Garibaldi Highlands
