That Notion mini-website I linked to is my own research. Not looking for or wanting credit for myself. You can cite my username if you are required to cite an author, or claim the findings as your own, I don't care (it's mostly just extracts from other documents anyway).
I also have some FOIPP documents from the District of Squamish, but as with DFO docs you'll need to give me your email for me to send them over.
Squamish Windsports Society had a website
http://www.realignnotremove.ca/ with a timeline of events related to spit removal. Apparently it's down now, nit might be not intentional, so you might want to ask them to bring it back up.
For more public info, you can search Squamish Chief for "spit removal" and "spit realignment". The articles basically regurgitate SRWS claims without any analysis or verification, so don't take everything there at face value.
https://www.google.com/search?q=spit+re ... hchief.comhttps://www.google.com/search?q=spit+re ... hchief.comWhat ended up as spit removal started as the idea to realign the spit while preserving land access to kiteboarders. Government provided funding for that, and they got more private funding from environmental orgs on the heels of that. Here is John Sturdy MLA making the announcement:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=68rBcrKqIW0Long story short, SRWS sat on their hands for a few years, using up most of that funding to build expensive culverts that are utterly and predictably ineffective (they won't publish any good data, but there are some bits and pieces in the DFO response). Now that their funding was about to expire, and they don't have enough money left to do actual spit realignment, they officially decided to remove the spit instead. Given everything I've researched, I believe they never intended to actually realign the spit, and that removal was always the plan from day one, but no one will admit to it, and of course they're professional enough to not put it in writing (or redact, or triple delete, how would we even know).
As to what started this, you can read SRWS's official claims and be satisfied with them if you so choose. You can also look at the motives of everyone involved, and judge for yourself if everyone involved has the environment in mind, or something else (opinion ahead):
* Federal, provincial, and municipal governments wanted a quick and easy environmental and reconciliation PR stunt. They got their headlines and photo ops when the funding was announced.
* Squamish nation wanted to assert their power, and they got that.
* Edith Tobe (head of SRWS) runs a local environmental consultancy (EB Tobe Enterprises) so of course it's good for her to get more more connections to governments, more power over environmental decisions in the region, and being in the news for all that is just good marketing. All the real estate developers who want easy environmental approvals in Squamish will happily pay such a persona to speed up their development applications.
* Whistler Excavations Ltd. are just happy to take money for doing all the construction / destruction work
* The media just regurgitate statements by various interested parties without doing anything to verify those claims, putting factual claims right next to hogwash as if both deserve the same attention.
This whole thing was framed by SRWS and the media as a salmon-vs-windsports issue, whereas the original funding agreement was specifically about making the two coexist. And when SRWS completely wasted all opportunities to accomplish that, instead of taking responsibility for their failure, they made it the windsports community's problem.
Did I mention that because this issue concerns use of public land in BC, it's automatically a reconciliation issue, and you're labelled a racist and a bigot if you disagree with whatever the local first nation wants? Did I mention the um, privately communicated consequences for non-compliance? I applaud your effort in getting to the bottom of this, but good luck trying to get anyone to speak on the record about such things. (I will not respond to PMs about this)