Yes, it did not take long to learn that a person, although they pay through the nose for taxes, and searches and appraisals, when they purchase a home,are wasting good money, for false promises. These become absolutely meaningless when the government decides they want what you have.
I am well aware battles have been waged over history in our country, when others had their rights ripped away. Rights to freedom, rights to fairness. My rights that I fight for, are minimal, in comparison, but, this is the battle I wage. This battle is on my mind, and in my heart, each and every day I awake, and every single night I lay down to try and sleep.
This battle wounds me, without visible scars. Every glance through my window, brings pain. Each moment I walk into my backyard, I am reminded that somewhere, someone is hoping to destroy what I have sacrificed for.
See, I did send in my written submission for the public hearings with the Joint Review Panel. I wrote that from my heart, and had all the best intentions on attending these meetings. However, I had just been laid off, and bills seem to be non-stop. I had a short term job offer, and had to take it, so I could keep paying those taxes and help with the mortgage. I missed the hearings. Yesterday I sat down, and spent almost 12 hours, listening to the audio recordings of the 2 days the Panel spent in Hudson's Hope.I had to listen to every word, because my way of life depends entirely on what occurs once this is all over.
I cried more than once. I never realized how desperate myself, and others in the same predicament are. I heard grown men, choking back their tears, trying to make strangers understand what they have to lose. People who spoke of their great grandparents, coming to this Valley, and the spots they can walk, those before them walked, and see the same incredible beauty. I heard an elder woman, trying to understand why she was suddenly faced near the end of her life, with her home drawn slap dab in the middle of an "Impact" line, and Hydro deciding her garden of 40 years, needed to be in their "right of Way".
Now all of you folks who have a home, who pay property taxes, who had to pay to do the upkeep, and pay the utilities. All of you who come home from work, with the satisfaction you are master of your own domain. Best sit down, and hear this! You do not own diddly!!! You are the master of nothing!!! Your house does not, nor ever will, belong to you. Your home,and your property belong to your government. I suppose, we belong to the government, as well.
WTF do you have to pay a huge chunk of cash to the government when you buy a home? What does that money give you? Does it protect you, and ensure that if you give up your family time, and go off to work for weeks at a time to pay your mortgage, and you forget vacations, and beauty salons, because you have found a spot that takes your breath away, and the only way you can afford it, is to forgo any type of social life? Why on earth do you have to dish out money for a search (which if you note, does not guarantee diddly) when, in truth, the government can simply walk in, and say "Out you go".
Oh, I listened to the Hydro folks, how they were asked about expropriation and their answer that it was the last thing they wanted, they dislike having to do that. Helllooooo...come on. No matter what "Fair local Market" price they offer, in a community that they have over the past years, played with the "Fair" making any property in this community pretty much worthless, they are going to take what we have, away.
Oh, I know, I get to stay in my home. One that for years will be, as our Mayor stated, the middle of a nutcracker. I will have all the same rooms, the same floors, the same windows. Who knows, after all the noise, and dust is over, I may have some sense of what I do now? Maybe in my 60's I will finally get the serenity I now have back? I am not a fool. I realize that there is absolutely no way most humans, let alone one with minimal patience, can endure continual construction outside their bedroom window, day after day, year after year, pausing only when the weather turns brutally cold.
What made me shake my head, was hearing folks who have, for some reason, had one on one meetings with the Site C folks. People who do have a home above where this berm is going to be built, but, will certainly not have any traffic in front of their home, and any noise will be at the back end of this construction. I have never had Hydro call me and arrange a meeting to discuss what they are going to do behind my house!
I am beginning to think this is part of the plan. Ignore those affected, and hope they don't clue in, until it is too late, and they simply sign over their home to Hydro. They certainly can't be dumb enough to think I won't be affected, but Joe Blow down the road deserves explanation about the few months disruption far below their home, can they?
I hope that no one else has to find themselves in the position of those impacted by this planned project. The loss of control over one's life, is emotionally draining. The continual cloud hanging over every moment, impossible to ignore, and unbelievably heavy. That single cloud that when it decides to open up, will take everything, so many have worked lifetimes for, and just wash it all away.
So, now, after more than 40 years of the specter of Site C hanging over the Peace River Valley, raising it's head again, and again, we reach the edge. Construction companies, government ministers, Union Halls, are all crossing their fingers. They hope for the job of a lifetime, they hope this is their chance to make the fortunes others made on Hydro's past huge projects. They glimpse their retirements, with pockets full of money, and warm climates. They are willing to pack up and move to the Peace, short term, of course. However, each and everyone of them will disappear when the money stops flowing, and the job is over. They will not have to witness what their job created.
Others, like myself also cross our fingers. We pray that this fast tracked project, with all the rules pushed aside, and absolutely no clear reason given that it is necessary, is finally seen as the senseless, destructive mistake, it truly is. For goodness sakes, people of British Columbia, stop this insanity before it is too late!!#nositeC
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