I could not understand how the world was in the throes of this environmental revolution but deep in the boreal forest, the pipeline right of ways were left to ‘natural recovery’. Oh, natural recovery, the buzz word in 2000 that literally meant doing nothing. I take offense to the statement that the ‘wildwest contractors threw grass seed on pipelines’ and called it reclamation. Those early contractors were pioneers and visionaries, who by today’s standards would have earned the title of entrepreneurs committed to restoring the land. As with any new idea, the technology and knowledge base takes time. I spent the better part of 2001-2002 looking for answers from the Alberta government , oil industry executives , university researchers, and stakeholders involved in the reclamation industry. THe one and only meeting we attended with Reclamation Society members, was frightening to say the least. One Alberta Environment employee who attended was clearly caught in a direct conflict of interest when frantic seed supply and reclamation business owners told her about their drastic loss in business. The fear and panic in that meeting room was palpable as these reclamation experts detailed the sudden decrease in seed orders and loss in contracts. I shouldnt have been surprised to learn that the President of the Reclamation Association was none other, than this woman from Alberta Environment. She told all of us that the government was trying out a new theory. The theory, was to NOT reclaimthe land to ’see if anything grows.’ I looked around expecting people to laugh. I told her that we have already tried this theory…for decades.. Isn’t that why the reclamation program was implemented? Because oil industry was doing nothing? I was quickly dismissed and the government employee and her assistant beat a hasty retreat when they say my binder of photos. My husband had dozens of aerial photos of pipeline right of ways that had been left to ‘nothing’. This new theory called ‘natural recovery’ was doomed before it began. We had several meetings with Sustainable Resource employees who alternated between agreeing that natural recovery was not the best choice for all pipeline areas and one minister’s assistant who was brutally honest. He told us, “Listen, these are oil companies. We don’t want to be too picky because they pay us a lot of royalties” If you have ever doubted that the government and big business is in bed together, you need never wonder again. This government employee , who worked in Sustainable Resources looked us straight in the eye and said, “So what’s wrong with just leaving it”? He examined photos of boreal forest post-pipeline that more closely resembled the desert . It was hundreds of kilometres of bare cracked dirt, snaking through the forest..cutting across water, native communities, animal habitats. This sentiment was echoed by several pipeline contractors I spoke with who grumbled at me. “Who the hell is ever gonna come up here and check anyway?” Unless someone bitches…we aren’t doing anything.” For a year or two all the pipeline reclamation contracts were given to any native resident living near the construction site. I called one major oil company to check up on how this was working out. He snapped at me and said, “We give them a couple bags of seed and if they want to spread it around when they are stumbling around out here..that’s fine. Otherwise, we consider the reclamation done.” Aside from the obvious damage and total disregard for the environmental damage, the financial loss to families and businesses like ours was disastrous. We had five children , a home and a lifestyle that was built on a business built over many years. To lose our only source of income was harsh but why we lost it was devastating. My husband never did recover emotionally and our family broke apart.He lost his livelihood but it was the callous disrespect that destroyed him. Overnight, he was suddenly treated like a pariah by the oil industry. Every call to every client was the same; No, we dont do any reclamation anymore. We don’t have to.” THe business relationships he enjoyed with long term clients also disappeared and his phone calls were considered nuisance calls, an annoyance. No one wanted to hear from any one trying to ’sell’ reclamation. The intense focus and time I spent on research and phone calls, took me away from the children. Our health suffered. Debts piled and eventually he admitted defeat to the bankrtupcy courts. It took a year or more before we realized that the loss of our business was not due to lack of advertising, marketing or our prices. We had 100% success rate in getting reclamation certificates for our clients. THe client base consisted of every major oil/gas company in Alberta, the big pipeline contracting companies and it was all built on word of mouth advertising. My husband, like the fellow in the conoco phillips ad(AB VEnture AUg 2010) also had a farming background. He could name any plant species and tell you when it had been planted, what stage it was at and how it would relate to all other plant species.This was not high tech University educated guy, but a man whose instincts for the environment made him the ‘go to’ guy when other reclamation contractors failed. He spent many days being transported by helicopter to RE-DO what other reclamation companies had failed to do. He used a method of transportation he engineered himself in order to maximize seed to ground dispersion. While the ‘high tech’ academic researchers spent the last 8 years doing ‘nothing’ and spreading b.s. to the rest of the world, we have lost almost a decade to untold devastation.
I don’t trust articles like this one. I don’t trust our government employees to preserve and protect this land.I do not trust the oil industry decision makers. We lived a real life version of the Emporers New CLothes; and paid the price.

Talk about BOSS! First starting off with Deer Creek Energy, now Laricina Energy Ltd. Whats next? ROSS

Talk about BOSS! First starting off with Deer Creek Energy, now Laricina Energy Ltd. Whats next? ROSS

I was looking for you a couple of years ago. It seems there was a competition for the general manager’s position of the Toronto Maple Leafs. If we could have teamed up, we would have been a shoe-in. I guess the Leafs had to settle for Brian Burke.

Anyhow, Cathy and I would love to hear from you. Drop us an e-mail when you get a chance.

John And Cathy Cole

To be clear, JEDI has never said that business is leaving our region for Camrose because they have municipally-owned land. In fact, at its annual strategic planning session, the JEDI board of directors examined the potential of municipal land development and decided against it, instead pursuing a broader range of advertising initiatives to raise the profile of our region and drive industrial development. In this article, Mayor Montgomery correctly states the risks involved in development, which is why the board decided to focus its efforts in other areas. JEDI strongly believes that industrial development should benefit everyone without negatively impacting their quality of life and that is a strong factor in the decisions the board makes.

It’s also unfortunate that this article fails to highlight the many successes JEDI has had in its industrial attraction initiatives. No less than 13 industrial parcels have been shared amongst the partners in JEDI’s Master Cost and Revenue Sharing Agreement. New industries like Alberta Highway Services and Spirit Pipelines chose the region as home in the past few years. As well, our local industries, including Speth Drilling, the Wetaskiwin Co-op, Annugas, and many others, continue to grow and expand.

Positive initiatives like Wetaskiwin Tomorrow, the upcoming Arts & Agriculture Festival, the partnership that brought SuperNet and videoconference to the region – is work that often goes unnoticed. These initiatives that the article fails to mention, combined with the new aquatic center and a downtown revitalization project, is work that JEDI promotes enthusiastically because it shows the community and the region is committed, driven, and effective.

While no one can deny that our community faces challenges (some unique, others common across Canada), there is significant economic growth and momentum in our region. If Venture had looked a little closer, they would have seen a group of residents, business, and industry, all working together for the mutual benefit of everyone.

Richard Horncastle
Director of Economic Development
Joint Economic Development Initiative

Lots of business owners can learn from you. Not just the green community.

And I say this, as someone who knows of the green business community although I’m not truly a member of the community.

Your principles rock.

Here’s why Tad’s approach is a home run in a civic cycle: http://www.beneaththecover.com/2010/07/15/pendulum-presentation-lets-engage/

High five Tad!

Kyle

PS – Tim mentioned he took one of your courses many years ago and was thoroughly impressed by your content, the depth of knowledge and also the stacks and stacks of books you owned and studied!!

I would suggest that many CEO’s at corporations as large as BP (and some not as large) would equally fail in similar disaster scenarios – simply because they are not educated on how to communicate with front line issues such as the Gulf Disaster (without having so many PR people and other VPs around to field the questions). Perhaps too many years at the ‘top level’ CEOs from the bulk of reality.

In the end – Tony has a large amount of money – but no integrity. Integrity is a tough one to ‘buy’.

As a CEO putting his big toe followed by the rest of his body into tar sands, I agree.

Patrick haynes

Thanks for the message. I don’t know if I necessarily agree with your statement but I’ve added a link to the photographers website to the page.

Also, the photographer is given a credit on the 50 most influential page where his photograph is featured.

http://albertaventure.com/2010/07/albertas-50-most-influential-people-2010/

Cheers

-dk

If anyone could claim the mantle of Tooker Gomberg V2.0 it would have to be Donny Iveson