A non-profit fishing club in Merritt won’t have to pay legal fees for a court case over access to public lakes.
In Kamloops Court, Justice Joel Groves ruled that the province and Douglas Lake Cattle Company will need to pay lawyer costs of the Nicola Valley Fish and Game Club.
Spokesman Rick McGowan says the club has spent more than $350,000 to fight for access to Minnie and Stoney Lakes.
“This is probably the best judgment we could’ve got, which essentially means we were awarded costs in the trial but now we’re awarded special costs, which means the lawyers can submit their bills at full rate instead of pro bono. We should come out of this owing no money which is amazing, and, save the two public lakes,” McGowan says.
“What it basically means is the road is public. There will probably be a little bit of negotiation on the road, on the length. Because you don’t need all the road to access the lakes. There’s probably going to be some road revisions in there, but there will be public access to both lakes, which is what’s paramount.”
McGowan says the six-year legal battle has costed all parties more than $1.5 million.
When asked to comment on the case and on if they plan to appeal, the Douglas Lake Cattle Company declined to comment to NL News.
Meanwhile, McGowan says its court battles appear far from over in seeking access to public lakes, as the club sued the province and Corbett Lake Lodge for allegedly blocking public access to Corbett Lake, located next to the Okanagan Connector not far from Merritt.
“We filed the lawsuit there because we heard a rumour that the government was going to trade a sliver of land between the highway right-of-way and the lake which would effectively block access forever, but consequently a lot of different evidence has come up,” he says.
“One aspect of it is a friend of mine in the club and I had noticed that members of the public, not our club, had cut the fence repeatedly. Basically we were protest fishing, climbing over and under it with ladders, but members of the public were just cutting the fence. So we decided to build a gate, and Corbett Lake personnel videotaped us and the RCMP are charging myself and this other fellow with criminal mischief for putting that gate in, damaging government property type of thing.”
He says he has been charged for mischief three others times but says the charges were dropped in each case.
“So potentially we have a criminal case for putting the gate in. Douglas Lake is most likely going to appeal for the Minnie and Stoney case, and then we have the Corbett Lake (lawsuit) case to go on. It seems like a never-ending process.”
