"We all love the eagles"
UBC Properties Trust staff and UBC managers discussed the eagle nest with the Board of Governors.
Monday, September 26, 2022, UBC’s Board of Governors held a discussion on their “plans to respond to concerns expressed in the community about the Eagle Nest located in the Wesbrook Neighborhood(sic).” A Campus Resident first reported on the eagle nest story in June, 2022. At that time, aside from a neighbourhood sign, very little attention had been paid to the development approval process for Polygon’s massive private market development across the street. Since then A Campus Resident published three additional stories and the regional media also picked up the story. By September (and after UBC Properties Trust and their contractors coned the nest) The Board of Governors decided they should pay the eagle nest some attention.
Miranda Lam, lawyer and chief Legal Officer to a Vancouver-based bio-tech firm and chair of the Board’s property committee, opened the discusion on the eagle nest:
So the next item is in relation to the eagle nest that is located in the Westbrook neighbourhood. Again, this is a topic that came up during our September 20 Property Committee meeting [in closed session], at which time we discussed the temporary coning that has already taken place on September 15 of an eagle nest located in the Westbrook neighbourhood. While this is somewhat an operational matter, there has been significant interest in this issue from the UBC community as well as from governors. And this issue has attracted, for example, a petition of over 18,000 members from the UBC community. It's been a subject to correspondence, some examples of the ways in which our community has tried to engage with us ... on this topic. So the Committee has asked our Vice-President of External Relations [Robin Cireri] to provide a briefing to the board. Just so the Board understands the steps that have been taken on site and in accordance with various regulations.
It is an ongoing issue. If you've been around the board table for a few years, you know that this has been going on for a number of years under some very careful stewardship. So perhaps, Robin, I'll turn it over to you to kick off the discussion.
In addition to being UBC’s VP-External, Robin Cireri is a UBC appointee to UBC Properties Trust Board of Directors. Paul Young, who presented on behalf of Properties Trust pointed out in his presentation that UBC appoints at least four directors to the PT Board which include UBC’s VP-Finance & Operations, the Principle of UBC-O, one former governor, and Santa Ono himself.
Cireri thanked the chair of the properties committee and began her comments:
Today we have with us on Zoom, Paul Young, who is the Director of Planning and Design for UBC Property Trust. I'll just make a few comments and then turn it over to Paul. One of the first things that I just want to give you as background is the UBC Property Trust, as you know, is responsible for implementing UBC's Neighbourhood Plan, and that includes securing all the development permits [related] to development activities and adhering to UBC rules and regulations. And also the Ministry of Forest is responsible for regulations and permits for protected species. So in the package and on the package accessible to those watching on Live Stream, it's a very detailed Eagle Connect Management Plan summary report [I have a detailed analysis of the July version of this report]. It shows the chronology going back to 2011 in terms of awareness of the eagles' nest care in wanting to protect the Eagles and make them a part of the UBC urban environment. In 2017, the monitoring of the next began, and you can see that chronology right through 2022 and Paul is going to give us the details.
Paul Young has been with UBC Properties Trust since at least the early 2000s. I recall meetings with Paul during community led discussions around plans and developments in Hawthorn Place. Later, when I was an elected Director on the UNA Board (2012-2016), Paul was a regular attendee and presenter to the UNA Board on local area planning issues.
Okay. Thank you, Robin. Thank you, Madam Chair. I'll give a very brief and quick summary of the timeline. As Robin said, you've already got it in your packages, and that's available to the public as well. It goes back about twelve years to when the nest was first observed in Westbrook Neighbourhood. It was at that time classified as an unoccupied or abandoned nest. Hadn't had any activity in it up until that time. But starting in early 2017, it was noted that a young eagle pair had started to utilize the nest. And so one of the first things we did was engage Diamond Consulting and their biologists to come and provide us with advice, as construction was ongoing. We need to have a management plan in place for how to do that, and monitoring of the behaviour of the eagles, and monitoring of our construction activities and procedures. So that monitoring started in 2017. It's carried on continuously since then. There hasn't been any construction since 2020, but there has been ongoing monitoring still, and the Eagles have returned each year during these past six years. In 2020, in addition to having Diamond Head continuing with their activities, we engaged a nonprofit foundation called the Hancock Foundation, who had something like 50 years of experience in dealing with raptor welfare, raptor conservation.
And they provided us with a new suggestion to build an alternate nest and place a cone over the existing nest for the period of the next construction cycle. This is something that they had had success with elsewhere. They achieved approval from the Ministry of Forests to go ahead and do this. And so in September 2020, we had Hancock build an alternate nest 300 meters north of the existing nest. And the intention at that time was to cone the original nest. But we knew that going forward, due to the impacts of covid, construction wouldn't be happening right away. So the cone was not installed at that time. That was left until this year to continue with that part of it. So in the earlier part of this year, I think in June, application was made to the Ministry Forest to place the cone this year. That permit was received on September 2 and with the condition that the cone be placed before September 15, which is technically the start of the next breeding season. So that was achieved. The cone went in place on September 14, and that will stay in place during the construction of the next project, which will be starting next summer.
At least that's the scheduled start for the project is next summer. Following completion of that project, the cone will be removed. So, just to summarize, ever since the presence of the eagles was noted, we have followed the best advice from biologists that we hired, from biologists that are from a nonprofit foundation, and from the Ministry of Forests biologists themselves. All have visited the site in person, all understand what we're doing, and all agree that this is the best approach for the ongoing welfare of the eagles. So with that said, I'd be happy to take any questions. I'm not an expert myself, but I'd be happy to let you know my answers if I know them.
Nancy McKenzie, Board Chair, then thanked Paul for his diligence in protecting the eagles:
Thanks very much, Paul, for the detailed timeline. And I think we will all agree that we're very fortunate to have these eagles living here on campus and want to do everything we possibly can to continue to have them be part of our community. So thank you for the work that you've done in the diligence in ensuring that they will be protected as we're continuing to work on the campus development. And I will open it up for further questions or comments from Governors Mark and then Max.
Elected UBC-V faculty governor, Mark MacLean, asked Paul what were the plans for monitoring now the nest was coned. Paul replied:
We will be continuing with the monitoring that's been happening today and that's I believe weekly that we'll be doing. Once the eagles are back, they typically show up again in November, December, and they start circling the nest. And of course, this year they will note that the nest has a cone in it, and so they will be looking at what their alternatives are. So hopefully they will be going to the alternate nest. That's what the biologists believe will happen. There's also a possibility that they will build a new nest on their own accord in a different location, another nearby location. So we don't obviously know how the eagles will think in response to this, the biologists think they know, but certainly observations that are made over the next few months will be important. Biologists that we've hired, plus, I'm sure lots of parties will be doing their own observations.
Max Holmes, elected student governor, followed with these two questions:
Thanks so much for the extensive package and the willingness to discuss at this board meeting. I have two questions here. The one I have is ... when properties trust makes these decisions, are they held in open meetings that members of the community can attend? So are those board meetings open to the community, or are they closed? And just what do we do to include community in those decisions, since they are obviously very important? And then the second question I have is an indigenous observer commented upon the artificial nest placement midway down the tree, and that that was absurd. They observed that never in their own home territory have they seen a nest like that. What publicly available data could there be to put people's minds at ease documenting the success of coning and encouraging Eagles to move to an artificial nest?
Paul replied:
I think on the first question, the decisions to engage the biologists and buy their advice, we're really just operational day to day decisions of our development team. It's not something that has ever needed to go to our board or for any kind of formal endorsement. It's all part of the procedures that are involved with managing a development. The second question was. …
Max clarifies his second question. In answering , Paul avoids the Indigenous knowledge portion of the question and cites the western science justification.
About the placement of the nest as well. And for those things, we've relied on expertise from Hancock Foundation. They're the ones who built the nest. They're the ones who, along with Diamond Head, who shows the location of the nest, which we did clear with campus and community planning as well, given that it basically constitutes a sort of temporary land use. And again, these were decisions that were made sort of virtually through emails with the consulting team in dealing with an operational issue. So it's not something that ever went to our board for any kind of endorsement. You're correct. Our board meetings are not open to the public, but there are four or more members of the university administration that are on our board and they would be able to advise if something needed to be run through a consultation process.
Anthonia Ogundele, provincially appointed governor, asked the next question:
I guess more just a very quick comment on it. Again, understanding that a lot of experts were advised and supported this process. And I understand that there were decisions that were made over the last number of years just in terms of getting this project through. I think we do have an opportunity with Campus 2050 to really think about what that means. I think Max's question is really relevant. So maybe that's something that we consider going forward in our process is not just about the livability, the types of buildings, but really the process that ensures the biodiversity.
Elected student governor, Georgia Yee, asked the final question regarding how UBC Properties Trust engages with the public.
Throughout the process, campus and community planning do have responsibility for providing avenues for community engagement. So when we take out a permit, for instance, we took a permit to place the cone as street and landscape permit. It was a very condensed time frame for that because of the limits imposed by the province. So there wasn't much opportunity to engage with the community. But certainly we have been providing that and will continue to provide community planning with the monitoring reports, the summary reports for that, and taking out whatever permits are required and going through the engagement processes that campus and community planning have in relation to those permits. So, yes, I take your point and I suppose the main avenue in which that will be achieved [is through Campus Planning].
I am unsure why officials in positions of authority seem locked in a narrative that can brook no dissent. From the Board Chair’s ‘we love the eagles’ to Young’s slow and deliberate presentation and all the official statements in between, there was no room left to allow they might actually be wrong or that there might be other reasonable approaches from what they suggested.
While I served on the UBC Board (2017-2020) I had noted (and had been part of) a push to greater transparency and openness on the board. This also involved pushing the executive team to consider alternative voices and viewpoints. It wasn’t alway ‘congenial,’ but with an insistent and active board, UBC’s executives did come to tolerate a bit more dissent and diversity of viewpoints from governors. There seems to have been a retrenchment back to a corporate style cabinet solidarity these past couple of years.
One coned eagles nest is simply a minor scene in the bigger drama of democratic reform. But it does outline some of general topography of the democratic retreat from the modest gains achieved by 2020. UBC deflects explicit responsibility to UBC Properties Trust (who has no obligation to report publicly to the community and often obfuscates information requests). Discussions on the core topic by Governors are placed into closed meetings. When it moves into open meetings the officials charged with presenting do so in a manner that is blind to alternative perspectives. Finally, few governors actually speak publicly, leaving it to the board chair, Nancy McKenzie, to say:
Thanks again, everyone, for the conversation. I think a couple of things. One, we all love the eagles and so we need to be sure that we are doing everything we can do to protect the Eagles. And thank you for the updates and I think just the communication pieces is so important to the community, ensuring that there is transparency around processes and the ongoing monitoring. So thanks for your commitment to that as well, Paul and everyone for the dialogue here and discussion.
Epilogue
Eagle nests weren’t the only bird nests on the agenda. Under the consent agenda (means items are not discussed in the board meeting), approval was sought and given to clear a patch of trees along side the Beaty Biodiversity Centre. Normally, special approval would not be requested prior to what is called Board 3 approval (final go ahead to build). However, if UBC waited for Board 3 approval that would place the land clearing during bird nesting season in the spring. This would thereby delay construction for 6 to 10 months. So instead of waiting, a special request to log trees beside Beaty Biodiversity was granted. According to a tweet from @UbysseyNews the trees being cut can’t be viewed from Main Mall.
That was the bird nest Board meeting on Monday, September 26, 2022. For those intersted, here is the twitter thread from my live tweet of the meeting.
They *say* "we all love the eagles," but they care about them only as a kind of decorative campus feature -- not as living persons with whom we share a habitat, and to whom we have a responsibility. The hypocrisy inherent in this exchange makes me so angry. At the same time the university is engaged in an Indigenous Strategic Plan and organizing activities for Truth and Reconciliation Day, they actually only do so as performative acts; in reality, they only pay lip service to Indigenous ways of knowing, Indigenous community members, and other-than-human persons.